An ACT candidate has withdrawn from a new Wellington
electorate race at November’s election, after failing to
declare her previous membership of a Chinese political group
linked to the country’s ruling communist
party.
After Local Democracy Reporting sent
questions about Lyra Yan Zhang’s background on Monday, the
party confirmed on Tuesday the Kenepuru candidate had
resigned – a week after her unveiling.
“All of our
candidates are asked to disclose previous political party
memberships. Ms Zhang did not disclose her previous
connections, and [on Monday] she decided not to continue
with her candidacy,” an ACT spokesperson said in a
statement.
Online publications by the China Zhi Gong
Party – a satellite party of the Chinese Communist Party –
reveal Zhang was a member who sat on party committees in the
province of Hunan.
Zhi Gong Party is one of eight
“democratic” minor parties officially recognised in
China’s one-party political system.
Researchers
into China’s foreign influence operations say it is a
“united front” organisation controlled by the CCP’s United
Front Work Department to assert influence on overseas
Chinese communities and mobilise them to promote Beijing’s
foreign policy goals.
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“Membership of the party
demonstrates a close affiliation with the CCP,” said Geoff
Wade, a senior analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy
Institute.
“Members of the party, even nominally
retired ones overseas, thus offer overt challenges to
democratic societies through potential influence and
coercion activities within the host society.”
Zhang
also ran in last year’s local body elections in Porirua,
coming 11th out of 15 candidates at the Onepoto General
Ward.
Zhang told The Post at the time she was a
Zhi Gong Party party member from 2017 until 2020, when she
resigned because of Covid-19, and was “not a current
membership for declarations”. She didn’t run under the
ACT banner.
ACT said it conducted “extensive
vetting” of candidates, including independent social media
and background checks, criminal record checks, and credit
checks. “This is alongside disclosure questions we ask
prospective candidates, including previous party
affiliations.”
Zhang, in a statement issued through
ACT, said she remained supportive of the party.
The
revelations are in the midst of New Zealand’s intelligence
agency saying China is the “most active” country in
conducting foreign interference and candidates being told to
be wary of foreign interference, which could risk damage the
reputation of the country, themselves or their
party.
At the end of 2017, businessman Zhang
Yikun, whose 2022 convictions over fraudulent political
donations to the National Party were later quashed by the
Court of Appeal, arranged for then Southland
mayor Gary Tong to visit China in the name of the Zhi
Gong Party’s central committee.
Zhang himself
welcomed Zhi Gong leaders to New Zealand in 2017 and
attended the party’s 90th anniversary in Beijing in
2015.
Lyra Yan Zhang moved from China to New Zealand
in 2001 to study English and graduated from Massey
University in 2006, according to a
2015 post on Chinese-language social media WeChat by her
now-defunct export company that sells milk, honey and other
health products to China.
In April 2017, a
report by the provincial Zhi Gong Party in Hunan said
Zhang was a member from its second branch in Lusong District
of the city of Zhuzhou. She played an “important role”
in arranging a visit to Zhuzhou’s high-tech industrial
parks from about 10 New Zealanders, it said.
By the
end of the year, she became one of six deputy chairs of a
new association made up by Zhi Gong Party members, who are
young diaspora with roots in Zhuzhou, according to the
website of the
United Front Work Department of Hunan’s provincial
CCP.
Zhang’s campaign for local office in
Porirua, centring on upgrading local infrastructure and
pledged to improve transparency on council spending, made no
references to her previous political involvements in
China.
ACT’s press release announcing its candidates
did not include Zhang’s biography.
ACT leader David
Seymour campaigned in 2023 on stopping
foreign investment from China to build New Zealand
roads: “We can’t just close our eyes and hope the CCP
don’t take the opportunity to gain a foothold in New
Zealand.”
Earlier this month, Beijing banned four
New Zealand MPs from entering China, Hong Kong and Macau for
a year over their visit to Taiwan, including National’s
Maureen Pugh, Labour’s Duncan Webb, ACT’s Laura McClure and
NZ First’s David Wilson.
Local Democracy Reporting
(LDR) is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On
Air
Content from the Local Democracy Reporting (LDR) service is published by Scoop as a registered New Zealand Media Outlet LDR Partner.
