Employment | Lei: unemployed residents refusing job offers by gov’t

Many local unemployed construction workers have refused to attend job interviews arranged by the Labour Affairs Bureau (DSAL), which is helping them to seek new job positions, the Secretary for Economy and Finance Lei Wai Nong said on Monday on the sidelines of the financial relief measures announcement.
Lei was questioned regarding the recent protest held at the DSAL on March 12. The protest was attended by over 500 local unemployed construction workers who also blocked traffic entering the premises.
He deemed the construction sector being vital to the city. Therefore, the government had spoken to them several times. However, the unemployed workers were not attending interviews, he claimed.
“We have enough job positions for this sector, but in many instances, local unemployed residents do not want to attend the job interviews and lose these job opportunities. We carried out a lot of subsidised training classes,” said Lei.
“Construction jobs are very demanding and demand a lot of physical energy, so we want to provide different job opportunities to unemployed residents, not just in the construction sector,” he added.
Echoing the same sentiments, DSAL’s director Wong Chi Hong hoped that local unemployed workers searching for jobs could grab the opportunities offered by the government.
He also stressed that the bureau has been conducting programs and professional classes for unemployed residents to widen their job market search.
The number of local job-seekers pursuing a position within the construction industry in Macau has been surging. As of March 1, there were 465 locals who had signed themselves up with DSAL to apply for a job in the sector, according to the official data.
The number of unemployed construction workers in Macau has been climbing as according to a release published after the protest, were 465 locals who had applied for a construction-related job through DSAL.
As of the end of January, the total number of local employees in Macau was 175,778, down 17,720 year-on-year. The DSAL vows to continue enhancing the mechanism for limiting the number non-resident workers.