Hong Kong waiter pleads guilty to inciting subversion via online posts, street posters

A Hong Kong man has pleaded guilty to inciting subversion via online posts and posters he put up in public places.

Chan Ho-hin, a waiter, appeared at the District Court on Thursday morning to enter his plea following his arrest in April last year.

He is accused of promoting a pro-Taiwan political party called the Revive the Republic of China Freedom Party through social media posts, local media reported.

Chan also put up A4-sized posters relating to the party on the streets of Yau Ma Tei and Wong Tai Sin, as well as sending out application forms for people to join the group.

His posts on X included messages opposing the Chinese Communist Party and the slogan “Liberate Hong Kong, revolution of our times,” which has been explicitly declared illegal under the city’s national security law.

Seven of the X posts featured “Glory to Hong Kong,” a 2019 protest anthem that the government banned two years ago.

Chan shared 1,184 posts on X between June 2024 and April 2025, according to the prosecution. He had 587 followers on the social media platform.

The case has been adjourned to July 20 for sentencing. He has already been remanded in custody for around a year and two months since his arrest.

Mitigation

Chan was originally charged in April 2025 with the lesser offence of publishing articles with seditious intent under the city’s homegrown security law, the Safeguarding National Security Ordinance, also known as Article 23.

But prosecutors later upgraded the charge against him to the more serious offence of inciting subversion under the Beijing-imposed national security law.

Inciting subversion is punishable by up to 10 years in jail, while the sedition offence carries a maximum sentence of seven years.

Sentences handed down at the District Court, however, are capped at seven years.

During mitigation, Chan’s lawyer said the offence was unrelated to political beliefs and that he had been under the bad influence of a man who is listed as the person in charge of the pro-Taiwan party on Taiwan’s Ministry of the Interior database of parties.

According to the prosecution, Chan and the Taiwanese man were in contact on the messaging app Line, and the defendant had expressed interest in going to Taiwan.

The lawyer added that the defendant suffered from epilepsy and intellectual disabilities.

Chan’s friend submitted a mitigation letter to the judge, saying that the defendant was ostracised at school and struggled to get validation in the real world.