Legislative Assembly works as a ‘rubber-stamp for the government’

Rita Santos, Pereira Coutinho and Leong Veng Chai

Legislators Pereira Coutinho and Leong Veng Chai have critically evaluated the 2015-2016 legislative year. In a five-point review, the lawmakers particularly criticized the work of Legislative Assembly (AL) for failing to serve the citizens with an effective supervision of the government’s policies.
In a press conference held yesterday afternoon at the Macau Civil Servants Association (ATFPM) headquarters, legislator Coutinho heavily criticized the role of AL during the legislative year.
Coutinho said that initiatives from the legislators were “weak and minimal,” and that “the AL does not pay importance to the legislative initiatives from the legislators.” This was exemplified by an initiative created by the two legislators regarding an interpretative note aiming to clarify the decree-law 33/81/M regarding the “Natural Heritage of Coloane” and that aims to prevent what the lawmakers call the “concrete invasion of Coloane.”
“The AL didn’t manage to find time to discuss one single article of our bill,” stated Coutinho claiming the example shows the “tendentious way the AL works, favoring the government in all they want to do,” Coutinho remarked, adding that “we think that AL needs to change its conduct in order to change its nickname of a [rubber] ‘stamp of the government’,” he concluded.
The transparency of the AL work was in fact addressed in several different ways with Coutinho extending criticism to the way Q&A sessions to the Chief Executive (CE) work, saying “[these kinds of sessions] do not contribute to clarify, explain and detail the questions raised by the lawmakers,” he said, affirming that the system that forces lawmakers to present the questions “one week or ten days in advance” does not work as the CE will only “read the answers” and not permit additional or follow-up questions.
Regarding these problems, the legislators propose an improvement of the system through “eliminating the pre-sending of the questions to the government […] and that could be added an additional time of 2 or 3 minutes to request additional clarifications in resemblance of what already happens for the spoken enquiries.”
Aiming to further add transparency to the work of AL, the legislators also propose the “press be authorized to assist to the standing committees meetings; being allowed inclusively to live broadcast the sessions in order to clearly inform citizens about the topics discussed,” as both legislators claim that “working behind closed  doors allows all kinds of discretions and abuses.”
When questioned by journalists specifically on the topic, both Coutinho and Leong admitted that the summaries done by the presidents of the standing or follow-up committees “often do not match with what was in fact discussed as they selectively choose not to address the topics that aren’t in the favor of the government.” Coutinho remarked that this has happened ever since he first joined the AL.
The lawmakers also took the opportunity to call on the government to promote more participation from citizens, namely public servants, in the elections, calling for greater representation.

Rita Santos says is ‘too early to decide’ whether to run for AL

Former deputy secretary-general of the permanent secretariat of Forum Macau and Chairman of the General Assembly of ATFPM, Rita Santos says “[it] is too early to take that decision [of running in the AL elections].” Santos, who was also councilor of the Council of the Portuguese Communities, recalls “when I took the decision to retire it was to dedicate myself to my family,” and “to have more time to give support to the legislators and to receive complaints and concerns from citizens.”
Santos claims that time is also needed to study and inquire with the population in order to gather the feedback from supporters to determine whether it is “worth running or not.”