[magnusjonsson]

But people elect the parliament and the parliament electthe PM, so it's OK, there's a chain of accountability to the populace. In HK, the parliament has only 70 seats of the 1200-member committee, and only 35 of those are geographical constituents representing the people, the rest are "functional" constituencies mostly representing businesses). Laws have to be passed by a majority of the LegCo however, and the Chief Executive can be impeached by a 2/3 majority in the LegCo, so the LegCo is still very important. The main tragedy is that only 50% of the LegCo is elected democratically.

[vmlinuz]

One interesting - and HN-relevant! - point is that the current member of HK's parliament representing 'Information Technology' is one of the leaders of the pro-democracy camp, and there was a semi-viral video this week of him confronting police inside the parliament building. He is one of the few pro-democracy members among the functional constituencies, and as a Hong Kong permanent resident and IT professional, I want to make sure I get the papers sorted to vote for him in the next elections...