Rear Window | Y-shaped dreams

Severo Portela

Sooner rather than later, the special structure/engineering work of art currently known by its simple and dry descriptive of “Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge” will get a much more deserving name in keeping with its level of importance and significance. Beyond the obvious aim of giving South China a precious piece of infrastructure to fuel the Greater Bay Area and the economic development up and around the Pearl River Delta, the 55-km Y-shaped superlative sea-crossing bridge is to be seen as an important tool to support the SARs of Macau and Hong Kong in integrating their own economic development into the overall development of China.

Such an ambitious design at 20 billion would inevitably raise doubts among democrats both in Hong Kong and Macau. Not only in their concern for a better use for their respective shares of funds but mainly because they associate the direct-line road link with a central move to exert further control in the special administrative regions on both sides of the Pearl River Delta.

As the saying goes, it is no use…the bridge that took a decade to build is there waiting to fulfill its Y-shaped dreams. Macau’s Chief Executive, speaking at the inauguration, pointed to the bridge as a way to facilitate MSAR’s contributions to the making of the Greater Bay Area and the Belt and Road Initiative. Perhaps, this was an oblique and elegant way to acknowledge the enormous contributions that mainland China made to the landing side of Macau.

Besides the practical and economic side of things, and forgetting for the same reason the fait accompli to the grievances of ecologists who blamed the “Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge” for the dwindling numbers of white/pink dolphins, the bridge looks likely to worry civil libertarian-minded people in Hong Kong as a symbol of belonging to the PRC.

The well-connected HKSAR – and since last month further upgraded with a high-speed rail link – could look onto the 55-km as a symbol of closeness, none other than an umbilical cord, as a reminder of China´s growing political influence in Hong Kong’s affairs. The above mentioned economic side of things will or will not be proven in time, but the political side of things is self-evident.

Again the 55-km long and award-winning engineering work of art, bridging from Lantau to make its Y in Zhuhai and Macau, stands there over the Pearl River Delta with totemic value in its symbolic or emblematic importance.  Allow us to quote roughly Xunzi: The person attempting to travel two roads at once will get nowhere.

In what concerns only Macau, so as not to retreat from the news of Hong Kong People being denied entry to the MSAR on the grounds of internal security – coincidentally apparently utterly legal – this time ahead of the inauguration, authorities stopped award-winning playwright Yan Pat-to.

Yan Pat-to waited two hours at the Macau Outer Harbor Ferry Terminal and then was given notification that no entry would be permitted despite claiming his visit was only related to an event co- organized by the Macau Theatre Culture Institute and the International Association of Theater Critics from Hong Kong. Yan says he told the Immigration Officer he had never had problems entering Macau, but the officer allegedly replied the rules have changed.

P.S: Finally, one closing note about veteran lawmaker Pereira Coutinho who is demanding the six standing committees’ proceedings be open to the media, thus to the public. Coutinho points his finger to colleagues who get free passes on declarations made indoors which are later contradicted in the floor session. It looks like the Land Law is causing ripples.

Let the sunshine in, says Coutinho.