China’s national organizations will have broad influence on a powerful 1,500-member panel that selects the city’s leader and almost half of its legislature.

The organizations, such as the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Chinese Academy of Engineering, will have a say in who gets to represent the information technology, accounting, legal and sports subsectors on Hong Kong’s Election Committee, under political reforms mandated by Beijing on Tuesday. The committee now has 38 subsectors.

Political commentator Willy Lam said that the mainland affiliates would not be able to serve the interests of Hongkongers as they were coming from national-level bodies.

“The central government is further diluting the ‘one country, two systems’ principle by adding many mainland elements into the Election Committee,” he said.

Under the changes to the subsectors, Hongkongers based in mainland China will take 27 seats.

Half of the 30 seats now held by the IT subsector will be returned by the Hong Kong members of the two academies. Similar changes will take place in accounting, legal and sports subsectors. Of the 30 seats in each subsector, nine to 15 seats will in future be selected by Hong Kong accountants who have worked with the mainland’s Ministry of Finance, Hong Kong members of the China Law Society, and members of the Hong Kong Olympic Committee.

The clout of national organizations will also extend to a new 300-strong sector to be added to the Election Committee, which currently has four sectors.

Those 300 members will include 110 who represent mainland organizations in Hong Kong, with the rest drawn from local delegates to the nation’s rubber-stamp legislature and top advisory body.

According to recent news reports, the 110 people will come from national-level groups controlled by the Communist Party, including federations of women, youth, returned overseas Chinese and a trade association.

Hong Kong’s pro-democracy camp had been gaining traction in the local establishment, defeating their opponents by a significant margin in a 2019 citywide election.

Beijing’s reforms will cut the camp down to size, by scrapping 117 seats held by predominantly pro-democracy district councilors on the Election Committee. These and other changes will further drastically diminish the presence of pro-democracy voices while enhancing Beijing loyalists’ positions.

Under the reshuffle, Hong Kong authorities will be empowered to handpick district-level advisers to sit on the Election Committee.

Those seats will be awarded to government appointees on district committees in charge of community activities, crime prevention and fire safety. They will occupy a total of 156 seats, accounting for 10% of the Election Committee.

The Election Committee is empowered to select 40 of the 90 members of Hong Kong’s Legislative Council under the reforms.

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