Two Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) graduates have lost a judicial challenge against their disqualifications from an election for the institution’s advisory body, after their pro-independence views or convictions arising from the 2019 anti-government protests were cited as grounds for barring them.

Walter Tse Wai-lok and Anthony Suen Ho-yin jointly applied for judicial review in November 2023, saying the university deprived them of a chance to be heard before disqualifying them from running in the institution’s convocation standing committee election in February that year.

In a written judgment delivered on Friday, Mr Justice Russell Coleman ruled against the pair, highlighting their failure to lodge the bid within three months of their disqualifications and the standing committee’s lack of public functions that would justify judicial intervention.

Coleman noted that even if the challenge succeeded, the ruling would not change the standing committee’s conclusion that the pair’s candidacy would bring the convocation into disrepute.

“It seems to me – not least against the then prevailing political and social landscape – that no amount of supposed remorse or regret could have deflected the [standing committee’s] conclusion, which was and is based on the inherent nature and gravity of the conduct in question,” the judge said.

He noted that while Tse and Suen complained of a lack of opportunity to make representations to the standing committee before their disqualifications, they should have realised their prior convictions or pro-independence stance would raise concerns about their candidacy.