IC: Compulsory footprint registration at Mount Fortress a miscommunication

Reports of the forced registration of visits to the Mount Fortress Corridor with the Macao Health Code app is the result of miscommunication, the Cultural Affairs Bureau (IC) hinted in its reply to an inquiry by the Times.

The corridor is a venue managed by the IC connecting the Lazarus District to Mount Fortress. The revolving corridor also acts as an exhibition space. Tickets are not required for entry to the corridor.

Over the new year holidays, the Times received a picture taken by a reader showing a handwritten note on a post supporting an electronic thermometer of the kind now widely used across the city. The reader said that the picture was taken at the entrance to the corridor.

The note read: “From January 4, 2022, the entry QR code [the footprint registration code] is to be used.”

The reader understood it to mean footprint registration would be mandatory, contradicting the government’s previous message.

Officials of the Health Bureau (SSM), including director Alvis Lo, has reiterated that footprint registration is voluntary. No individual should be coerced into doing so.

The Times paid a visit to the corridor yesterday to confirm. At the upper entrance, no such sign was posted, apart from the health code and body temperature checkpoint.

However, the note was found at the lower entrance of the corridor. 

The Times confirmed that entering the corridor through either entrance did not require footprint registration.

We has also visited several public venues – including the Central Post Office and the Financial Services Bureau headquarters – with none requiing entrants to scan the footprint registration code.

In response to an inquiry from the Times, the IC spokesperson said that the note was not posted by the IC but by security guards at the corridor. The IC has instructed the security service provider to remove the note, and to explain to users that footprint registration is voluntary.

Footprint registration QR codes have been rolled out in all government venues, as announced previously by the SSM.