Anna Lo facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Anna Lo MBE
Lo in 2014
Member of the Northern Ireland Assembly for Belfast South
In office 7 March 2007 – 7 May 2016
Preceded by	Esmond Birnie
Succeeded by	Paula Bradshaw
Personal details
Born	Anna Manwah Lo (1950-06-16)16 June 1950 British Hong Kong
Died	6 November 2024(2024-11-06) (aged 74) Belfast, Northern Ireland
Political party	Alliance
Spouses	David Watson (divorced) Gavin Millar (divorced)
Children	2
Alma mater	University of Ulster
Profession	Social worker
Chinese name
Traditional Chinese	盧曼華
Simplified Chinese	卢曼华
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin Lú Mànhuá Yue: Cantonese Jyutping Lou4 Maan6 Waa4

Anna Manwah Lo, MBE (16 June 1950 – 6 November 2024) was an Alliance Party politician in Northern Ireland. She was a Member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA) for Belfast South from 2007 to 2016. She was a former president of the Alliance Party.

Early life

Lo was born in North Point, British Hong Kong to Cantonese Chinese parents. She attended Shau Kei Wan East Government Secondary School. She moved to Northern Ireland in 1974 after meeting journalist David Watson.

She spent her early years in the country working for the BBC and the Royal Ulster Constabulary as an interpreter. In 1978, she started an English evening class for Chinese people in Northern Ireland.

Political career

Lo was elected to the Northern Ireland Assembly for Belfast South in the 2007 assembly election. She is the first and, to date, only ethnic-minority politician elected at a regional level in Northern Ireland and the first politician born in East Asia elected to any legislative body in the United Kingdom.

Lo stood as an Alliance Party candidate in Belfast South. After her re-election in 2011, Lo was appointed the chair of the Northern Ireland Assembly's Environment Committee. She used this role to influence the Local Government Bill. As a result of her amendments, the new Councils have greater levels of openness and transparency as the audio of the main Council meetings is now recorded and Council papers are placed online. She further improved the freedom of the press at the new Councils by ensuring that journalists and the public can use social media during meetings.

She was selected as the Alliance Party's candidate for the Northern Ireland constituency in the 2014 European Parliament election. She received the highest percentage of votes in an European Parliament election for her party until that election. Her performance was surpassed in 2019.

Political views

Lo declared her preference for Irish unification. She described herself as anti-colonial and said the partition of Ireland was "artificial". Lo also referred to herself as "a socialist and a republican in the international sense".

Personal life and death

Lo was a social worker and former chair of the Northern Ireland Chinese Welfare Association. She was awarded an MBE for services to Ethnic Minorities in the 2000 New Year Honours.

From 2007, Lo suffered from non-Hodgkin lymphoma managed by a vegetarian diet to combat the illness.

An atheist and a self-described humanist, Lo was a supporter of Humanists UK and its Northern Ireland branch, Northern Ireland Humanists. In 2015, she was the only MLA of seven non-religious MLAs that was willing to go public as an atheist to an interview with the BBC. She helped to launch Northern Ireland Humanists at an event in Stormont in 2016 and supported many of the charity's campaigns.

Lo died following an illness on 6 November 2024, at the age of 74. In a statement, Alliance Party leader Naomi Long said "Anna will forever be remembered as a ground-breaker in local politics. Her service to the Chinese community, to good relations and to the city of Belfast, much of which went unseen by most, was transformational."

See also

• European politicians of Chinese descent