Despite zero public discussion, Secretary defends necessity for Cotai hospital expert residences

Residences for non-local experts for the future Cotai hospital are still subject to discussion by the Urban Planning Committee (CPU), Secretary for Social Affairs and Culture Elsie Ao Ieong said yesterday in defense of the project.

The official was asked to discuss the matter on the sidelines of a Cultural Development Advisory Committee meeting.

The project was unearthed and reported by Chinese newspaper Cheng Pou on May 9. Before that, no disclosure was made by the government.

Lawmaker Ron Lam also criticized the government’s manner of handling the issue during one of his pre-agenda speeches at the parliament. He questioned if public funds are at the government’s disposal without even being discussed by society.

To ease debates, the Secretary for Social Affairs and Culture, Elsie Ao Ieong, emphasized that the project has not yet been approved, because its plan still needs to be discussed at the CPU.

Legally, the CPU has no right to veto plans submitted by the government. Previously, the plan for a new wing of a criminal court building, despite generating widespread public objection, has been approved by the CPU.

Ao Ieong disclosed that according to government plans, there will be 230 apartments.

The current land plot has the capacity for 340 apartments.

Nonetheless, she said the government, as of yesterday, did not have an exact figure on the number of non-local medical specialists needed by the future hospital. However, the first phase of the hospital’s operation will see about 50 people being sent in from outside of Macau.

Despite hoping to hire as many managerial staff members in Macau as possible to fill about 500 positions, Ao Ieong said the odds of hiring medical specialists in Macau are small. She assured that the income generated by the future hospital will go towards the government’s accounts rather than the operator’s.

She further disclosed that during negotiations with the Peking Union Medical College Hospital (PUMCH), the Secretary recalled that one of the many core topics was where medical experts from Beijing should stay during their services in Macau.

“There was a process,” Ao Ieong said.

Her reason for providing such a defense was that when the Cotai hospital was planned, there was no indication that it would be managed by the PUMCH, and therefore the government had no idea about the need to import such a large cohort of medical staff from outside the city.

“There was no such plan,” she said.

As time went by, the Secretary said, and “as we realized that we have nice facilities, we started to contemplate whether we needed additional medical staff to help cure diseases of people in Macau, so that they will not need to travel outside for cures for severe illnesses, such as cancer.”

Later, she explained that the government realized that while there were good facilities and experienced medical staff, “they have nowhere to stay.”

She admitted that the Cotai hospital has a dormitory for medical staff, “but it was built for emergency service medical staff, which is on stand-by during severe meteorological scenarios.”

The dormitory also does not have enough rooms, according to the Secretary.

Renting apartments privately was not an appropriate option, she said, for the government has no means to maintain stable and affordable rental levels.

Meanwhile, on her trip to Portugal, the Secretary’s delegation focused on healthcare and medicine as well as education and culture, and met with officials overseeing these areas. Exchanges were also conducted with entities, schools and universities.

Medical collaboration deals, such as recruiting doctors from Portugal, were also discussed with the Portuguese Minister of Health.

“The Minister welcomed the suggestion and we will now work to identify retirement plans for doctors from Portugal,” Ao Ieong disclosed. “We have also confirmed deals to send local doctors for training in Portugal.”

The official further disclosed that discussions on attracting Portuguese pharmaceutical companies to Macau were also held.

In the area of culture, Ao Ieong said that research collaborations will commence on archival documents. “The Portuguese Archive has certain documents written in Chinese, and we will consider the possibility of sending staff from our Cultural Affairs Bureau (IC) to work on the documents together,” she said. “It will also be beneficial to the professional development of our staff at the IC.”

On education, the Ao Ieong said that discussions were held with regard to Macau secondary school students studying medicine in English at the Catholic University of Portugal.

Recruitment of native Portuguese language teachers was also discussed but not much progress was seen, the official said. On the other hand, the Secretary also wanted to hire Portuguese Special Education Needs (SEN) teachers.

Yesterday’s meeting discussed subsidies for films made in or featuring elements of Macau. Each project has a ceiling of MOP2 million for the former and MOP250,000 for the latter. The total budgets respectively will be MOP12 million and MOP2.5 million.

A key requirement is that the sponsored films should not contain erotic elements or elements that violate national security of the People’s Republic of China. Public screening of the productions is also a requirement.