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The following is issued on behalf of the Electoral Affairs Commission:
In the lead-up to the 2015 District Council Ordinary Election on November 22, candidates are busy with their electioneering activities. The Electoral Affairs Commission (EAC) today (November 2) called on candidates and other people to abide by the electoral guidelines and relevant legislation to ensure that the election will be conducted in a fair, open, honest and clean manner.
"As many electioneering activities would involve election advertisements, and any costs incurred on the publication of election advertisements will have to be included in the candidates' election expenses, candidates and other people have to pay special attention to the legal requirements in connection with election advertisements and election expenses," a spokesman for the EAC said.
According to law, an election advertisement is any form of publication published for the purpose of promoting or prejudicing the election of any candidates at an election, and election expenses are expenses incurred or to be incurred before, during or after an election, by or on the behalf of a candidate for the purpose of promoting the election of the candidate, or prejudicing the election of another candidate or other candidates.
A candidate must provide a copy of the election advertisement for public inspection according to the means specified by the EAC within one working day after the publication of the election advertisement. All the costs incurred on election advertisements should also be included in the return of election expenses after the election. In addition, it is an offence for any person to incur election expenses if he or she has not been authorised by the relevant candidate as an election expense agent.
"Regarding messages published by any persons or organisations, including political organisations, professional or trade organisations, or other district organisations, during or before the election period and irrespective of the form of publication, which directly or indirectly appeal to electors to vote or not to vote for some candidates or candidates of some organisations, although the messages do not contain any names of candidates, reference could be made from the messages concerned to identify the candidates being promoted or prejudiced by an elector in the constituency concerned and, therefore, depending on the entire relevant circumstances of the time, the messages may most probably be regarded as election advertisements. The expenses so incurred on the publication of such messages will also be regarded as election expenses incurred by or on the behalf of the candidate," the spokesman added.
If expenses are involved in the publication of the election advertisement and the publisher is neither a candidate nor a candidate's election expense agent, the publisher may commit illegal conduct under the Elections (Corrupt and Illegal Conduct) Ordinance. Any person who engages in illegal conduct at an election commits an offence, and is liable on conviction to a fine up to $200,000 and imprisonment for up to three years.
If the candidate instructs that person or organisation to publish the election advertisement, the candidate would also violate the same law if such expenses are not accounted for as election expenses.
Ends/Monday, November 2, 2015
Issued at HKT 17:16
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