AL election | Cloee Chao focuses on gaming employees’ welfare

Cloee Chao (center) and her supporters

Cloee Chao, founder of the Macau Gaming Industry Frontline Workers’ Union and first candidate of list 25, “Linha de Frente dos Trabalhadores de Casinos,” said that the top focus of her campaign is on the social welfare of gaming employees.

“I hope to improve the holiday calendar of our gaming employees, as well as their welfare […] the gaming operators promised a lot, such as housing subsidies […] I hope that if I can enter the Legislative Assembly [AL], I can speak for some of the requests which we have had for many years,” Chao told the Times.

Chao has been asking the government to enhance the welfare of gaming employees for a long time. During a phone interview with the Times, she explained some of the reasons why her platform focuses on gaming-related issues.

“In the beginning [when Macau granted casino operating concessions to more operators] the gaming operators guaranteed that the casinos were offering good welfare conditions and long holidays. […] However, now, the concessions [have been extended to more operators] but not one extra holiday has been added to the calendar,” Chao told the Times.

“We all know that the current AL is comprised of many people from the gaming sectors, but they are all bosses, while [the AL] lacks a voice coming from within the primary class,” said Chao.

She hopes for a “miracle” election as her campaign has limited resources.

Besides benefits for gaming employees, the group hopes for a trade union law, fewer non-local workers in some sectors, and stricter tobacco control policies.

Today is the last day for all candidates to carry out their promotional activities.

Despite saying that the evolution of her campaign “is alright; it is beyond our expectation,” Chao mentioned that she faced pressure from some gaming employees.

“Even though they are gaming employees, they lay pressure on us in some chat groups which only have gaming employees, but I don’t know whether they were ordered to do so,” Chao revealed.

Chao hopes to obtain at least one seat in the AL. For several years, she has organized demonstrations and asked the government for better welfare for all gaming employees.

When recalling her previous efforts, Chao said that there have been good outcomes in the sector.

“The Chief Executive promised that no non-local workers would ever be allowed to work as dealers. In the first several years [after the concessions were granted to more operators] we all thought that it was impossible to ban smoking inside casinos […] how come these bosses suddenly allow it? The area for the mass market, however already banned smoking. […] Many casinos also offer bonuses. […] Many employees tell us about unfair situations that happened to them, and then we contact the casinos, and we receive responses many times,” said Chao.