Rear Window | An official position

Severo Portela

Besides the commonly applied superlatives giving the enclave its singular profile – trivia, such as cars inch by inch or the squeeze of people sharing space, air and water, GDP piling upon baccarat tables or going up in smoke – it should be noted that Macau holds a very good position in the ranking for number of committees, sub-committees, working groups, joint-groups, groups; hereby not counting the never ending non-governmental associations.
Worse than the annoying army of committees, the definition or scope being of but secondary concern, is only the long-established willingness to reproduce as soon as reform goes into agenda, or even worse, when difficulties or troubles challenge the government into action. To make the point, take notice of the number of overlapping departments taking care of public works and transportation. If not a recipe for a disaster at least a seasoned tactic used to put at abeyance any inconvenience.
And there is one more committee in town, one to help the Chief Executive transform Macau into an international city. Chui Sai On outlined, and we do quote, “seven aspirations” through which to realize the overall vision of a World Centre of Tourism and Leisure. However, if we go and consider one by one the suggested seven pillars we are recreating the CE’s policy address, better known by its Portuguese acronym LAG. Actually, the seven aspirations are to maintain economic vitality, develop the structure of local industry, improve infrastructure, to enhance the quality of life for the people of Macau, to improve standards in education, to raise awareness about the environment, and strengthen good governance and the rule of law.
At face value, there is nothing substantively new in these seven aspirations that aim to help Macau to “manage its macroeconomic policy, and to strengthen the long-term mechanisms for delivery of education, social security, healthcare, housing and cultivation of local talent”. In other words, this is an agreeable agenda.
This said, we have to set aside the seven aspirations and look for the relevance of the new committee both in its formal elements and in its guiding principles. The committee for the Development of the World Centre of Tourism and Leisure is politically a boundary spanning committee underpinning close active cooperation between the Central Government and the Macau Special Administrative Region: The five-year plan “incorporates” advice from the National Development and Reform Commission, funneling contributions from Tsinghua University in Beijing and from other agencies, like the CNTA (China National Tourism Administration).
More than this, under “the seven aspirations” lie around 21 tools to fulfill the larger agenda, for example, to optimize the planning of the city or to encourage regional integration. One cannot be less than intrigued with the decision to publish the five-year blueprint together with the Policy Address for the 2016 Fiscal Year. At least it runs the risk of overlapping if not coming surprisingly similar to a LAG.
Final note: We ought to believe that the new five-year plan may help to overcome some problems such as the serious pollution levels or to put some order into the shoddy statistics or help lessen the shortcomings in accountability, transparency and openness. Omertà, however, works against a public feedback system.