Starry Lee

The Honourable
Starry Lee Wai-king
SBS, JP
李慧琼
Chairman of the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong
Assumed office
17 April 2015
Preceded by Tam Yiu-chung
Member of the Executive Council
In office
1 July 2012 – 17 March 2016
Appointed by Leung Chun-ying
Preceded by Lau Kong-wah
Succeeded by Ip Kwok-him
Member of the Legislative Council
Assumed office
1 October 2012
Preceded by New constituency
Constituency District Council (Second)
In office
1 October 2008 – 30 September 2012
Preceded by Tsang Yok-sing
Succeeded by Ann Chiang
Constituency Kowloon West
Personal details
Born (1974-03-13) 13 March 1974
Hong Kong
Political party Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong
Alma mater Hong Kong University of Science and Technology
University of Manchester
Occupation Accountant
Starry Lee
Traditional Chinese 李慧琼

Starry Lee Wai-king, SBS, JP (Chinese: 李慧琼, born 13 March 1974 in Hong Kong) is a Hong Kong politician, chairperson of the largest pro-establishment Beijing-loyalist party, the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong (DAB). She is a Legislative Councillor for the District Council (Second) functional constituency and a Kowloon City District Councillor. From 2012 to 2016, she was a member of the Executive Council.

Biography

Born in 1974 in Hong Kong into a working-class family and brought up on a public housing estate,[1] Lee obtained her Bachelor of Business Administration from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology and Master of Business Administration from the University of Manchester. She became a professional accountant, working for KPMG in Hong Kong and is currently the principal at CCIF CPA Ltd.

Lee first stood in the District Council elections in 1999 for the Kowloon City District Council, the neighbourhood where she lived. She was elected aged 26, the youngest district councillor at that time.[2] She joined the pro-Beijing Democratic Alliance for the Betterment of Hong Kong when she was approached by the former party chairman Tsang Yok-sing around 2004. She was asked to become the part of Tsang's team in the following Legislative Council election in September 2004.[3] She was listed third on the candidate list and helped Tsang to win a seat in the Kowloon West.

With her professional background, Lee became a new star in the party and also the pro-Beijing camp. She was elected to the Legislative Council with around 39,000 votes, nearly 19 percent of the vote share, when Tsang left the constituency for Hong Kong Island in the 2008 Legislative Council election. In 2011, she was elected as the vice-chairwoman of the party.

In 2012, she was appointed to the Executive Council by Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying. At the time, she was the only person to hold positions in three different levels of representative councils, the Executive, Legislative and District Councils. She served on the Executive Council until her resignation in March 2016, when she said she wanted to focus on her work on the Legislative Council and the party. Her position was taken by Ip Kwok-him, a veteran DAB legislator.[4]

In the 2012 Legislative Council election, Lee contested in the newly created territory-wide District Council (Second) "super seats". Her ticket received over 270,000 votes in total. On 17 April 2015, she was elected as the first woman to chair the DAB, succeeding Tam Yiu-chung.[5]

After Lee was re-elected in the 2016 Legislative Council election, she succeeded Andrew Leung of the Business and Professionals Alliance for Hong Kong (BPA) to become the chairman of the Legislative Council House Committee, the second highest office in the legislature. In 2018, she was invited to seat in the 13th National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC).[6]

Controversies

In 2010 Lee refused to sign a petition to help ban import of highly endangered Atlantic bluefin tuna to Hong Kong, saying that her daughter loves sashimi and she does not want her daughter to get mad at her.[7]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Chan, Bernard (30 April 2015). "Breaking the mould in Hong Kong politics". South China Morning Post.
  2. ↑ Jasper Tsang – Laws of attraction
  3. ↑ Chan, Quinton (21 August 2006). "Life in the patriotic camp". South China Morning Post.
  4. ↑ Wong, Hermina (17 March 2016). "Breaking: CY Leung appoints Ip Kwok-him to Executive Council following Starry Lee's resignation". Hong Kong Free Press.
  5. ↑ "民 建 聯 領 導 層 改 選 　 李 慧 琼 當 選 主 席". RTHK. 17 April 2015. Archived from the original on 17 April 2015.
  6. ↑ "第十三屆全國政協香港委員名單 - 香港文匯報". paper.wenweipo.com (in Chinese). Retrieved 2018-01-31.
  7. ↑ "A beastly feast". HK Magazine, 2010
Political offices
New constituency Member of Kowloon City District Council
Representative for To Kwa Wan North
2000–present		 Incumbent
Legislative Council of Hong Kong
Preceded by
Jasper Tsang		 Member of Legislative Council
Representative for Kowloon West
2008–2012		 Succeeded by
Ann Chiang
New constituency Member of Legislative Council
Representative for District Council (Second)
2012–present		 Incumbent
Preceded by
Andrew Leung		 Chairman of House Committee
2016–present		 Incumbent
Party political offices
Preceded by
Tam Yiu-chung		 Chairman of Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong
2015–present		 Incumbent
Order of precedence
Preceded by
Wong Ting-kwong
Member of the Legislative Council		 Hong Kong order of precedence
Member of the Legislative Council		 Succeeded by
Gary Chan
Member of the Legislative Council
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