Kapok: Collective empowerment

José Pereira Coutinho’s arguments are pretty straightforward: Macao needs a long overdue Trade Union Law for three sets of reasons. First, because this is enshrined in Article 27 of the Macao Basic Law—Macao citizens shall have “the right and freedom to form and join trade unions.” Second, because Macao is a signatory to several international conventions that make it mandatory to recognize such a right, namely the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights as well as the Convention concerning Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organize (1948), one of the 36 conventions of the International Labor Organization (ILO) applicable to Macao. On several occasions, the ILO as well as the International Trade Union Confederation have exposed the many legal loopholes that translate into “insufficient protection” for all when it comes to joining a workers’ organization or having the right to collective bargaining in Macao. And third, because most of the countries in the area are equipped with such a law: not only Korea, Singapore or Taiwan, but even Hong Kong with the Trade Unions Ordinance or the People’s Republic of China that has had its Trade Union Law since 1992.
A trade union law provides a legal framework for unions to be organized, clarifies their process of formation and defines their responsibilities, and this in order to effectively protect the rights of the workers — a key to the protection of human dignity. It is also thanks to unions that employees engage with society at large and more importantly exercise their right to collective bargaining conducive to co-decided — meaning more harmonious — and improved work conditions.
As of now, only the Macao Federation of Trade Unions (FAOM), one of the three main so-called grassroots “traditional associations” along with the General Union of Neighborhood Associations (“Kaifong”) and the Women’s General Association, has an obvious claim to being a union, although it is somehow in competition with the “Kaifong” when it comes to representing the interests of the working class. However, over the years, and more so since the mid-2000s, its “representative” role has come into question — it has lost a directly elected seat in the 2013 legislative election — and it itself, despite its 56 affiliates and 80,000 members, does not actually operate as a “federation of unions” but rather as a collective of associations, with a somewhat exclusive right to recognition by the government and employers because of its “pro-establishment” status.
Yet, the last time Mr Coutinho submitted a Trade Union Law proposal in April 2014 — for the fifth time! — it got defeated by 14 votes to 9, and among the supporters were the three representatives from the FAOM, the two representatives from the “Kaifong”, the two democrats and Mr Coutinho together with his partner Leong Veng Chai. Among the naysayers one finds all the government-appointed lawmakers — the whole seven of them — and mainly pro-business legislators — including Angela Leong. In fact, if we only consider directly-elected MPs — as suggested by almacau.net — the law would have been accepted by 7 vs. 3, and this in no small thanks to the abstention of Chan Meng Kam’s “group” as well as the rather populist Zheng Anting.
There is no doubt that this absurd and backward deadlock played a significant role in encouraging some seven groups representing casino workers to meet at the Fisherman’s Wharf last week to collectively push for another go at a trade union bill championed by Mr Coutinho. Featuring prominently among these were Power of the Macau Gaming Association, formed in May 2014 by local gaming employees in managerial positions working for Sands and chaired by Stephen Lau Ka Weng, the convener of the meeting, and the Macau Gaming Industry Frontline Workers, headed by Ieong Man Teng, that became famous after it organized very visible marches around several casino properties last year, ultimately leading to salary hikes. In effect it was the first such gathering of different “independent” associations and a promise was made to meet on a quarterly basis. Clearly, the month of May in Macao has become one of collective empowerment!

Published in Macau Daily Times, May 29 2015

Kapok: Embrace a Full Ban!

When conflicts of interests are too blatant, public debate can only be farcical, and yet it is revealing of the challenges confronting the new government. The recent exchanges between some legislators and the Secretary for Social Affairs and Culture, Alexis Tam are a remarkable case in point.
Ever since he took office in December 2014, Mr Tam has made no secret that his number one concern would be “public health” and shortly after a comprehensive survey on the “Regime for the prevention and control of smoking” was released at the end of January, he announced, supposedly “on his own” – or so are we led to believe by not so-friendly commentators – that the government would submit a revised piece of legislation within the first half of 2015 that would make way for a full ban on smoking inside casinos, thus implying that VIP rooms would be involved and smoking lounges on mass floors no longer allowed. Mr Tam reiterated that engagement in April during the policy address, and again this week, while reporting to the legislators.
On Mr Tam’s side, there is an ever-growing corpus of medical studies showing that second-hand smoking is in fact as bad as direct inhaling, recommendations made by the World Health Organisation (agreed to by China’s Ministry of Health since 2007) noting that there is no existing technical solution that will equate to non-smoking, and quite a significant number of business-minded pieces of scholarship attesting that smoking bans have not had an adverse impact on revenues in business sectors of direct concern, and essentially the hospitality sector. Clearly, full smoking bans in public places are the trend, so much so that even permissive New Orleans has banned smoking in bars, casinos and other public areas starting on April 22nd.
Mr Tam has also on his side the spirit of the law that was passed in 2011—the first aim of the law being “to protect [the citizens] from exposure to tobacco smoke”—, the fact that the main causes of death in Macao are aggravated by the exposure to tobacco smoke, and the wish expressed by the frontline workers of the industry to see a full ban on smoking being implemented—87.20% of those directly exposed, the croupiers and casino floor staff. Moreover, in the broader context of China—something far more prevalent these days—the National People’s Congress has committed the country to “full implementation of the smoking ban in public places” ever since it voted in the 12th Five-Year Plan in March 2011.
Adversely, Mr Tam is pitted by the gaming industry that has been relentless in trying to lobby every level of government—including Beijing in March during the double congress—in favour of airport-style smoking lounges, with separate ventilation systems and negative pressure in relation to adjacent areas, in accordance with the regulation published by the Chief Executive in June 2014. Several casino operators, including one with a seat in the legislature, have argued that voiding the previous (and rather recent) regulation would make limited (and costly) sense, and moreover that gambling revenues have been in shambles since June last year and thus a full smoking ban could translate into an additional loss estimated at 15%—no methodology given, but the figure is repeated over and over again.
The problem is that it took an extraordinary amount of time to pass the initial law (16 months, to be precise) back in 2011, and this in no small thanks to Mr Chan Chak Mo (a representative for culture!), one of the most vocal voices against Mr Tam today and the number one defender of the food and beverage industry—his group, Future Bright, is everywhere to be seen in all casinos and just lost 95.6% of its profits in the first quarter of 2015. The problem is then that casinos benefited from a three-year reprieve. The problem is that many casinos failed the health bureau tests and everybody was playing cat and mouse with the new regulations.
More compliance with the spirit of the law might have prevented a change in tune. Lobbying failed, now there is only room for embrace.

Published in Macau Daily Times, May 15th 2015

Olho mágico: Um líder intrigante / Peephole: The puzzling leader

Being midway through his first term as supreme leader of China, Xi Jinping became itself an object of study and question, as is another form of a "new normal", especially after having driven a break radical with the ancient Chinese leadership and the "lost decade" of Hu Jintao. But the governance Xi Jinping is also a "case study" by the depth and scope of what the Chinese leader designated as a priority in terms of policy orientation, with the fight against corruption to stand out clearly visible. [...]

Published in Ponto Final, May 15 2015

And the text original in English with web links:

Being now halfway into his first mandate as China’s supremo, Xi Jinping has become the object of many probes—another form of “new normal”—, mainly because of his apparent clean break with the previous leadership—the so-called “lost decade” of Hu Jintao—as well as the depth and reach of everything he has undertaken or designated as a priority in terms of policy-making, among which the fight against corruption stands a distant first. Assertiveness at home and abroad has become his trademark and his self-confident and earthily personal style has made his ultimate goal to salvage the perennial rule of the Communist Party of China (CPC) very convincing for many.

In a recent “educated poll” run by Foreign Affairs flashily entitled “Will China Crumble? ,” some 32 experts and scholars from various sectors and background were asked whether or not they agreed with the assertion that “The current Chinese regime will not survive the next decade without major reform” and quite surprisingly 19 of them disagreed or strongly disagreed with the statement, 6 stayed neutral and only 7 agreed or strongly agreed. Despite the relative vagueness and ambiguity of the question—are we talking exclusively about political reform? Does it necessarily mean a breakthrough towards liberal democracy? Is it “reform” versus “revolution?—this is a clear indication that beyond the two major dangers of soul-searching anti-graft purges and declining economic growth—the backbone of the Party’s legitimacy—there is a significant level of confidence regarding the ability of the Party-state under Xi’s helmsmanship to overcome the seemingly inconsistence of having economic reforms without ultimately engaging into far-reaching political reforms. In the enduring contest between the idea of “authoritarian resilience” coined by Andrew Nathan in the early 2000s and the one of inescapable “collapse” because of inherent internal contradictions popularized by Gordon Chang, Pei Minxin or more recently David Shambaugh, resilience appears to have the upper hand. Yet, all these experts do not see China as an alternative model to liberal democracy and none for sure agree with Daniel Bell’s latest claim that “Chinese-style political meritocracy can help to remedy the key flaws of electoral democracy”.

The resolve of Xi’s action has thus translated into a perceived renewed capacity of the Chinese state to deliver on its promise of modernity, but Xi the “Born Red” leader is still pretty much a puzzle, despite his impeccable princeling credentials and being the most “advertised” Chinese ruler since Mao Zedong—several books of his selected works have already been published, including a “Study China” (xuexi zhongguo) smartphone App providing his complete writings, favorite poems and travel agenda, and “Xi Dada”, “Big Uncle Xi” as he was nicknamed by the state news agency, can be found on stickers, pins, as a statuette and even comics and animated cartoons. Many an observers have highlighted that this could amount to a revamped form of cult of the personality, and yet Xi Jinping is portrayed as being genuinely “accessible” to the people—in one of these cartoons, the presidential Chinese dream becomes the one of winning the World Cup! Despite the many references to the Maoist era and the heavy crackdown on civil society and any form of dissenting view—more so if it is suspected to be under a “Western influence”—most of the reforms in the economic and social realms appear to be guided by pragmatism. If the wish for a Chinese rejuvenation or renaissance, as argued by Willy Wo-Lap Lam in his Chinese Politics in the Era of Xi Jinping, is hard to refute and has been part of the political master narrative since the humiliation of the First Opium War, other ulterior motives are less ascertained.

In a somewhat traditional neo-authoritarianism perspective, the concentration of power in the hands of a single enlightened leader is made necessary to keep stirring the boat in the right direction, and clearly the cape to avoid at all cost is the one that has presided over the demise of the Soviet Communist Party, precisely because of a lack of confidence and resolution—obviously quite an obsessive thought. For Willy Lam, the excessive monopolization of power that forces even Premier Li Keqiang to play second fiddle, the ad hoc creation of leading groups and committees that somehow circumvent the collegial power of the Politburo Standing Committee, the lack of promotion of the so-called 7^th generation of leaders, together with the admiration that Mr Xi holds for Vladimir Putin and his 15 years of uninterrupted exercise of power in Russia are an indication that the design might go beyond the salvation of the CPC and suggest a wish for Mr Xi to stay in power at least up to 2027. For a liberal thinker like Wu Jiaxiang, this tight grip over power and the fending off of rival factions and vested interests within the party correspond to a consolidating stage that necessarily precedes further reforms. The puzzle remains though: depending on the tightness of the grip, one always risks choking off the potential for innovation and reform.

Kapok: Groundhog Day

In the 1993 comedy “Groundhog Day”, Bill Murray plays a weatherman who falls victim of some form of never ending time loop while reluctantly covering a seemingly dull and repetitive story about a rodent able to forecast the weather: each and every morning, the very same day starts all over again, and the weatherman is stuck on February 2nd. What appears as an opportunity at first, providing endless occasions to influence the same situations for both worst and best, soon turns into a nightmare, as the now much wiser character discovers the limits of his newly-found omnipotence. Ultimately, only the discovery of his true benevolent self will allow him to break free from this doom—this is after all a Hollywood movie.
Beyond the growing annoyance, this feeling of everlasting repetition made pointless by the powerlessness of the protagonists is obviously what resonates most in the hearts and minds of many people in Macao when it comes to “traffic issues”. The problem is: Macao is no Hollywood!
While on the trail to win an election for which he was running unopposed last August, Mr Chui went the extra step of gathering people’s “opinions and suggestions”—let’s say grievances. Quite unexpectedly it seems—we had been told time and time again that “housing” was the No. 1 problem—it was reported in November that the most pressing concern for Macao residents was actually the one concerning traffic. At the time, a very inspired Lao Pun Lap, the head of the government think-tank, revealed that even though he did not have the “exact figure” for the breakdown of these 87,425 “opinions” (out of a total of 111,246) exclusively troubled by “traffic issues”, a majority of citizens expected the government to give high-priority to public transportation, and that the number of vehicles on the road should be limited, the number of parking spots increased, the LRT construction work sped up and the overall management of traffic flow improved.
This is pretty much in line with observations and suggestions—clearly I cannot use the word “commitments”—that were developed back in 2009 in the “General Policy on Traffic and Land Transportation in Macao (2010-2020)” issued by the Transport Bureau (DSAT): the future in terms of “mobility” was bleak if projections from 2010 were to be trusted (too many private cars, too slow a traffic, lengthened commuting time and too much pollution) and thus a duly identified impending disaster required swift actions and long term planning. According to that document, by 2012, the priority was to be the reorganization of “public transports” and “the safeguarding of commuting”, and by 2015, the “metro” would have started operating and “tangible results in every area supporting the ‘primacy of public transports’” would have been achieved. Let’s face it: every aspect of the four step action plan of that 2009 blueprint—improving public transport, reasonably managing private vehicles, creating a sense of flawless mobility and pursuing the construction of infrastructures and a better education regarding road safety—are utter failures.
The new Secretary for transport and public works, Raimundo do Rosário, is absolutely right when he hints at the fact that the issue of traffic congestion and the ways to solve it are a matter of collective responsibility. When newspapers are filled with full-page ads of cars whose speed and size are simply insane for a 30 sq. kilometer territory, they bear a responsibility. When people pressure the government to keep the price of petrol and the tax on vehicles low, they share part of the blame—and the same goes for legislators who speak on behalf of the said people. When the government fails to organize sensible tenders for big infrastructure projects, or when it proves unable to supervise the realization of these projects, or when it makes a mistake in the type of contract it issues for the concessionary exploitation of the city’s bus lanes, it does indeed bear another significant part of the responsibility.
The failure to address the challenges of fast deteriorating mobility in Macao has already had a great impact on our mind—peace of mind—, lungs and purse, and clearly breaking free from that apparently inevitable trap will require far more than good intentions and benevolence.

Published in Macau Daily Times, May 1st 2015