A student at Hong Kong’s Lingnan University is challenging in court the school’s decision to disqualify him from a top council election last year.
Isaac Lai, vice-chair of the Lingnan University Students’ Union, appeared at the High Court on Friday to dispute the public university’s decision to bar him from running in the top governing council election last November.
At that time, the university accused Lai of “promoting himself by non-official means” and disqualified him from the election one day before the vote, according to local media reports.
Lai filed the lawsuit in March, asking the court to overturn the university’s decision after his internal complaint to the university council was rejected.
Lingnan University registrar Margaret Cheung and the university council were listed as the respondents in Lai’s challenge.
Lawyers for Lai told the court on Friday that he only used his personal Instagram account to share his election platform, Sing Tao reported. That account was private and not openly accessible, they said.
They also argued that the university’s election rules did not explicitly restrict candidates from promoting themselves through official means, and that Lai’s disqualification was unlawful.
But lawyers representing the university argued that the rule restricting election promotion to official channels could ensure a “fair election.”
Lai knew the rule but deliberately posted QR codes linking to his Instagram account on campus, hence breaking election rules, the university’s lawyers said.
Judge Russell Coleman will hand down his judgment on or before July 31.
