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April 30, 2025
Wednesday 30 April 2025
Paul Sakkal
The Sydney Morning Herald
Australia’s election integrity watchdog, which includes intelligence agencies and federal police, has opened a probe into a video showing volunteers for independent MP Monique Ryan saying they were directed to vote for her by organisations with historical ties to China’s foreign influence operation.
On Monday, this masthead published a video showing two people in Ryan campaign T-shirts handing out the teal MP’s how-to-vote cards and saying they were directed to vote for Ryan by Ji Jianmin.
Ji is the president of the Hubei Association, an organisation representing people from the Chinese province that has also been accused of working with the United Front Work Department, a central party agency that advances CCP interests at home and abroad.
Another group he oversees, the Huaxing Arts Group, writes biannual reports to the United Front and includes its database of Australian political figures and community groups, according to research published in 2020 by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute.
“The Hubei Association president Ji Jianmin, how should I say this, he required us Chinese diaspora to support her,” one of the Ryan volunteers, whose name is given only as Jessica, said in the video published on April 22.
A spokesperson for the Australian Electoral Commission said it had become aware of the video when it was published on Monday and would review it.
“This includes referral for consideration by the Electoral Integrity Assurance Taskforce,” it said in a statement.
“It is important to note that Australia has a secret ballot. Nobody knows how another individual votes. Your vote is your choice. We have also published advice to voters about influence in Australian elections, including a general reminder for all voters that every voter is responsible for making their own decision”.
The taskforce is made up of officials from several government agencies, including the AEC, ASIO and the federal police.
Coalition home affairs spokesman James Paterson said after seeing the video that it should be urgently investigated as “if confirmed, this would constitute an act of foreign interference in our democracy”.
On Tuesday morning, Ryan said she would co-operate with any investigation.
“[The volunteers in the video are] people who attended a dinner where a community leader [Ji] said that he supported me, and he supported my values, and thought that I’ve been very supportive of the community in recent years, and for that reason, he thought people should support me now,” she told Sky News.
“I’m grateful for the support the Chinese Australians have given me in the last three years.”
“I don’t want there to be any concerns about this, and in the interests of full transparency, I’ve contacted the AEC and the Department of Parliamentary Services and given them the details that I gave to The Age yesterday about my relationship with those volunteers and with Mr Ji and I’ve said, look, if you’ve got any concerns, please investigate.”
She appeared to contest the interpretation of what was said by her volunteers in the video.
“Twenty per cent of the constituents of Kooyong are Chinese-Australian, and they deserve to be represented. I’ve tried to do that. I’m not sure about the interpretation of that video, you know, whether it’s accurate,” Ryan said.
“But certainly no one has been compelled to volunteer for me.”
Asked if she had sought Ji’s endorsement, Ryan said she had not: “I haven’t, no, I haven’t. Mr Ji is somebody who I do know. He’s attended a number of meetings that I’ve held in the community. I often hold forums for Chinese Australians.”
Said she had also held meetings with him in the presence of others about small business issues and visas, but that she had “never had a one-on-one meeting with him, and I’ve never asked for his support in any way”.
In a parliamentary speech from June, Ryan said delays in subclass 888 visas – known as “golden ticket” visas that require $5 million of investment in Australia – were making it hard for some Kooyong residents of Chinese heritage to do business.
Paterson told ABC TV on Monday that the video was disturbing.
“An organisation connected to the [United Front Work] department, which is the overseas influence arm of the Chinese Communist Party that Xi Jinping has described as his ‘magic weapon’, has been directing people to volunteer on the campaign of Monique Ryan in Kooyong,” he said.
“Monique Ryan [must] be transparent about what involvement she’s had.”
Ji leads the Hubei Chamber of Commerce and the Australian Hubei Association, both of which represent the central Chinese province home to almost 60 million residents and the seventh-largest economy in the country. He also oversees the Huaxing Arts Group, which is a performing arts organisation.
The groups were formerly run by Tom "Mr Chinatown" Zhou, who was arrested and extradited to China in 2020 over suspected money laundering and corruption following an investigation by this masthead into Crown casino junkets.
Zhou’s legal status is unclear, but the Herald Sun reported in 2023 that he was unlikely to be released for five years.
A 2018 submission by researchers Clive Hamilton and Alex Joske to a federal parliamentary inquiry cited the Australian Hubei Association as among “United Front-linked business groups”.
Ji was contacted for comment and acknowledged he had seen written questions from this masthead about his alleged endorsement of Ryan, but did not respond to them.