More than 72,600 people cast their ballots during the first hours of Sunday’s Legislative Council election, after authorities extended voting hours from 7.30 am to 11.30 pm.

By 8.30 am, almost 68,000 people had voted in the 10 geographical constituency races, representing 1.7 percent of the electorate.

More than 4,400 functional constituency voters had cast their ballots by the same time, for a turnout rate of 2.3 percent. Of the 30 functional constituency contests, voters in the Commercial (third) constituency were the most eager to get going–with more than 62 percent of voters casting their ballots within the first hour of polling.

For the Election Committee constituency, where 50 candidates are competing for 40 seats, the turnout rate was above 15 percent in the first hour of polling.