The two candidates competing to be the leader of Hong Kong faced off in the final debate Thursday night, in which incumbent chief executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) Donald Tsang and his rival Alan Leong took questions from journalists and the public.

This is the second and also the final public debate between the two candidates since March 1, when they attended a forum organized by members of the Election Committee which will elect the next chief executive of HKSAR on March 25.

The debate, organized by eight broadcasters of Hong Kong and televised alive, was held at the TVB studio in Tseung Kwan O, and attended by journalists from the eight news media and nearly 200 representatives from the public.

During the one-and-half-hour debate, the two candidates answered 16 questions ranging from those on politics, economic development and poverty relief to education and a clean society. At the end of the debate, the candidates briefly summarized their statements.

This is also the first election forum thrown open to the public, whose representatives had been selected at random by the Hong Kong University and Lingnan University, and the two candidates answered 10 of their questions.

At the March 1 forum, questions from the public were e-mailed or faxed to the forum's organizer who picked the questions at random and submitted to the candidates.

The organizer of Thursday's forum said the TV debate was aimed at giving the public a chance to directly raise questions to the candidates and further learned about their respective election platforms.

The third term HKSAR chief executive will be elected by the 796-member Election Committee in a secret ballot in Hong Kong on March 25, and appointed by the central government.

Source: Xinhua