A pro-democracy party will be filing a formal police complaint after one of their local politicians was pepper sprayed during a protest in Sheung Shui on Saturday.
Video circulating online shows a police officer grabbing Sai Kung district councillor Lui Man-kwong, of the Neo Democrats party, and roughly shoving him on San Wan Road. Lui topples over into a nearby bush and is surrounded by officers in riot gear, then sits up and raises his hands above his head to show officers he’s unarmed.
A police officer then pepper sprays some protesters who had rushed to Lui’s aid, directing the stream of pepper spray over Lui’s head.
After a beat, the officer appears to think better of not spraying Lui himself, hosing down his face with a hefty helping of pepper spray, even as Lui remains seated with his hands up.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Lg-zO8zd_Y
Speaking to reporters yesterday afternoon, Lui said that at the time of the incident, he and his colleagues were trying to tell officers to give protesters some time and space to disperse and leave the area. He insisted that he was trying to mediate between police and protesters and had no intention of stirring conflict, but felt someone grab him by the shirt and throw him to the ground before he was pepper sprayed.
“At that time I couldn’t see a thing, but then I felt someone from behind pull me up and I believed it was a protester.”
Lui said he initially told everyone to leave him in the bush because he couldn’t see, but some protesters and colleagues helped him up and took him to a bathroom to rest and wash his face.
He added that he couldn’t see for about half an hour.
In a separate interview with Apple Daily, Lui likened the experience of getting pepper sprayed to “getting pricked by needles.”
Lui’s party, the Neo Democrats, strongly condemned the police’s use of excessive force against one of their members, and added that they would file a complaint to the Independent Police Complaints Commission.
Lui was one of thousands of people who turned up to the rally in Sheung Shui, an area just across the border from Shenzhen that’s full of pharmacies and cosmetics stores, and is a popular among small-time traders who buy goods in bulk and resell them on the mainland.
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