Eddie Chu

The Honourable Eddie Chu Hoi-dick
朱凱廸
Member of the Legislative Council
Incumbent
Assumed office 1 October 2016
Preceded by	Tam Yiu-chung
Constituency	New Territories West
Personal details
Born	(1977-09-29) 29 September 1977 Hong Kong
Citizenship	Hong Kong permanent resident
Nationality	Hong Kong Chinese
Political party	Land Justice League
Spouse(s)	Au Pui-fun (m. 2010)
Children	1
Residence	Kam Tin, New Territories
Education	Tehran University
Alma mater	Chinese University of Hong Kong
Occupation	Community organiser

Eddie Chu Hoi-dick (Chinese: 朱凱廸; born 29 September 1977) is a Hong Kong social activist and politician. He is a member of the Local Action and founder of the Land Justice League which are involved in conservation and environmental movements. He is known for his actions against the demolition of the Edinburgh Place Ferry Pier and Queen's Pier in 2006 and 2007 and Choi Yuen Tsuen in 2009 and 2010. He was elected to the Legislative Council of Hong Kong in the 2016 Hong Kong Legislative Council election in New Territories West.

Social activism

Chu was born in Hong Kong in 1977 and was educated at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. After his graduation in 1999, he studied Persian language at the Tehran University in Iran and worked as an editor and reporter, covering news in several Persian-speaking countries after he returned to Hong Kong.^[1]

Chu became involved in cultural conservation and environmental issues and founded an activist group called Local Action. In 2006, he was one of the leaders to launch a campaign against the government's decision to demolish the Edinburgh Place Ferry Pier for the Star Ferry and the Queen's Pier to make way for the land reclamation project.^[1] He camped inside the pier with other protesters and filed a judicial review with another environmentalist Ho Loy against the decision of the then Secretary for Home Affairs of 22 May 2007 not to declare the Queen's Pier a monument under the Antiquities and Monuments Ordinance (Cap 53). The Court of First Instance dismissed the judicial review application on 10 August 2007.^[2]

In early 2009, he formed the Choi Yuen Tsuen Support Group to support the villagers who were forced to relocate due to the construction of the Guangzhou–Shenzhen–Hong Kong Express Rail Link (XRL). The movement grew into a massive protest in late 2009 and early 2010. After the proposal was passed by the Legislative Council in a controversial manner despite the protesters sieged the Legislative Council Building, Chu helped the villagers to rebuild a new eco-village.^[1]

In mid 2011, he took part in setting up the Land Justice League, a community movement organisation. He engaged in grassroots work in Pat Heung and San Tin. He opposed the government's proposal of the North East New Territories New Development Areas.^[1] He was also involved in a "Going Local" campaign to preserve farmland and develop a sustainable communal economy in the New Territories.^[3]

He ran in the 2011 District Council election in Pat Heung North, a constituency tightly controlled by the rural force. He ran again in 2015 District Council election in Pat Heung South under the banner of Urban-Rural Link, a campaign launched by the trio to promote green living and sustainable development.^[4] Despite his loss, Chu increased his votes from 283 to 1,482.^[5]

Legislative Councillor

In 2016, he and like-minded, Demosisto's Nathan Law and Democracy Groundwork's Lau Siu-lai, contested in the Legislative Council election, where he ran in the New Territories West. He received the highest votes in the geographical constituencies by winning 84,121 votes without any party backing, leading the first runner-up, New People's Party's Michael Tien by about 13,000 votes.

During the campaign, Chu took on the Heung Yee Kuk over the its land rights, drawing public attention to the long-time allegations of collusion between the government, business, landlords and triads behind the Wang Chau housing project, which made the government to scale down the housing project from 17,000 flats to only 4,000 due to the pressure from the powerful rural leader Tsang Shu-wo who owned the brownfield land in Wang Chau.^[6] After the election, Chu was placed under round-the-clock police protection when he reported receiving death threats against him and his family.^[7][8] The incident escalated into a political crisis in the following weeks as the government was questioned over the alleged collusion.^[9][10]

In the Legislative Council, Chu initially joined the 27-strong pro-democrats' caucus with Nathan Law and Lau Siu-lai but soon quit the caucus.^[11] In the 2017 Chief Executive election, he supported radical legislator Leung Kwok-hung of the League of Social Democrats (LSD) to run for the Chief Executive through an unofficial civil petition, despite the mainstream pro-democrats backed former Financial Secretary John Tsang.^[12]

Chu was criticised for his remarks in the pro-democracy primary of the 2018 Legislative Council by-election, in which he commented on Facebook warning the chance of veteran politician Frederick Fung, who became a backup candidate after losing to Chu-supported Yiu Chung-yim in the pro-democracy primary in case of Yiu's candidacy was disqualified, winning as voters might refuse to vote for him and therefore the camp should not blindly abide by the backup agreement. Fung later on announced his withdrawal as a backup candidacy, stating that he was under pressure. "Someone from the progressive democracy bloc told me that if I ran in the poll, they would definitely send someone as well [to challenge me],” Fung said. Chu denied he had been the one pressuring Fung to withdraw.^[13] Chu was also held responsible after Yiu who was believed to be largely dependent on Chu's campaign strategy, was narrowly defeated in the by-election.^[14]

Personal life

Chu married his former colleague Au Pui-fun from the media industry in 2010.^[15] The couple have a daughter named Puk-tsin, literally meaning "not relocating", commemorating his activism against the relocation of Choi Yuen Tsuen.^[16]

See also

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Eddie Chu.

• Hong Kong Express Rail Link controversy
• Wang Chau housing controversy

References