One in five Hong Kongers consider leaving, poll finds

HONG KONG: More than one in five Hong Kongers would consider emigrating as pessimism grows over the former British colony’s political independence, a survey showed.

Hong Kong is in the midst of a showdown over how residents will select the city’s next leader in 2017, pitting students and other pro-democracy activists against Beijing’s move to assert greater control over the semi-autonomous Chinese city.

Residents overall feel pessimistic about the political climate, according to the poll conducted by the Chinese University of Hong Kong and released on Sunday. On a scale of zero to 10, with zero being “extremely pessimistic”, the average response was 4.22.

Just over 21% of respondents said they would consider leaving the city altogether given the current climate.

“Hong Kong is on the brink of another wave of mass migration,” said Sonny Lo, a professor at the Hong Kong Institute of Education who is unaffiliated with the poll.

“More and more people will leave in the next few years as the election for the chief executive approaches.”

It saw waves of migration leading up to the transfer of sovereignty from the UK to China in 1997, when tens of thousands left every year.

Emigration also surged in the wake of the Tiananmen crackdown in 1989, when Beijing violently suppressed protests by thousands of students calling for democracy. —AFP