Almost 24 years after China took back control of Hong Kong from Britain, this was the moment it remade the free-wheeling, sometimes unruly territory’s political system in its own image. The symbolism couldn’t have been starker. Seated in the Great Hall of the People, 2,895 delegates voted in favour of the changes, none against. Whether the one abstention was a miscue on the electronic voting buttons, or a lone act of defiance, we’ll never know.
