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Macau's First 'Patriots' Election Sees Low Turnout
Authorities disqualified 12 candidates and arrested an opposition lawmaker under new 2024 election rules enforcing allegiance, resulting in a 53% voter turnout from over 328,000 registered voters.
- Macau held its first 'patriots only' Legislative Assembly election on September 14, 2025, with over 175,200 residents voting to choose 14 of 33 legislature seats.
- The election followed 2024 law amendments granting national security officials final authority on candidate eligibility, leading to 12 hopefuls being barred and a former legislator arrested in July.
- Authorities operated casino shuttle buses to ferry workers to polling stations and made public transport free to boost turnout amid restricted candidate lists with only six direct election lists offered.
- Voter participation reached 53 percent of the over 328,000 individuals registered, representing one of the lowest engagement levels in recent elections despite setting a record for the total ballots cast since Macau's 1999 handover, including 5,987 blank and 7,077 invalid votes.
- Observers noted Beijing's intent to suppress dissent, expecting lawmakers as rubber-stampers, while some voters expressed that Macau lacks real politics amid narrowing political space.
41 Articles
41 Articles
Only 53% of those entitled went to the polls in the former Portuguese colony despite the shuttles that led to the voting of casino workers to collect the urgent invitation of the head of the local governmentSam Hou-fai. In July 12 candidates had been excluded and a former parliamentary arrested in the name of the "national security" imposed here by Beijing. Even among those who voted many white and null descents.
Macau’s first ‘patriots only’ election sees low turnout
Macau’s first “patriots only” legislative polls on Sunday saw one of the worst turnout rates in recent years, preliminary results showed, after authorities disqualified a dozen candidates and arrested a former opposition lawmaker. A person casts his vote at the Salesian Institute of the Immaculate Conception polling station during the Legislative Assembly election in Macau on September 14, 2025. Photo: Eduardo Leal/AFP. The Chinese casino hub — …
FOX 28 Spokane
Macau’s first ‘patriots’ election sees low turnout
Macau's first "patriots only" legislative polls on Sunday saw one of the worst turnout rates in recent years, preliminary results showed, after authorities disqualified a dozen candidates and arrested a former opposition lawmaker. The Chinese casino hub -- with a population just shy of 700,000 -- amended its election laws in 2024, giving national security
ABC FOX Montana
Macau's first 'patriots' election sees low turnout
Macau's first "patriots only" legislative polls on Sunday saw one of the worst turnout rates in recent years, preliminary results showed, after authorities disqualified a dozen candidates and arrested a former opposition lawmaker.
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