I must admit it is often tricky to “draw the line between academic research, political commentary and direct political intervention”—to quote my former employer, and for sure, the easiest way to draw that line is to make sure that there can be no conflict between these three forms of endeavor by just eliminating the first one, even though your mission is precisely to make sure that everything academic is protected under your watch.
If you don’t write about politics from an academic perspective, then there are few chances that you will be sought after to provide political commentary and for sure any “direct political intervention” will be seen as “just” the act of any citizen, unless you become yourself an “activist”, that it is to say a recognized figure of a political movement.
Many questions arise from that “easiest” path: is it worthy of a university to let go of sophistication and decide that all intellectual undertakings should be governed by the most basic law of electricity of “on or off”, depending on the circumstances? Is it even effective in the short-term and can the expected trade-off, set at a few tens of millions, be “safely” secured? Is it sustainable in terms of image and standing in the community, and if yes, how so? From a moral standpoint, the “easiest” path is plain wrong because the end justifies the means, but then, even from a practical and almost cynical angle, what are the actual benefits going to be?
Now, regarding my own “convictions”. I know no political scientist who is not a democrat at heart. How can one studying “power in a social context” and deciphering the best forms of government be in favor of totalitarianism or even authoritarianism given our dark and traumatizing twentieth century? And even if we let go of the old categories, everybody knows, even the highest officials of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), the dangers of plutocracy—the government of, by and for the wealthiest—and kleptocracy—the government of confiscators/thieves. Why would Xi Jinping engage in such a wide-sweeping campaign to fight corruption if that was not the case? Why would close to 200 members of the Central Committee of the CCP, including a few from the elite Politburo, fall for good because of that new operation to catch “flies as well as tigers”?
Sure thing, “democracy” is not as popular as it used to be in the People’s Republic, say up to March 2012 when then Premier Wen Jiabao emotionally spoke about the need for political reform following democratic imperatives.
In fact, democracy seems pretty much the target of the “Seven Speak-Nots” defined in May 2013 as the taboo subjects that should not be discussed openly in the press or by academic circles (universal values, civil society, citizen rights, judicial independence, freedom of the press, past mistakes of the communist party, and the privileged capitalist class). Should that affect Macao? Is there any Communist party in need of restructuring in Macao? Is there a party that does not want to see its capacity to rule affected by an unquestionably weakening drive to uproot corruption in its own ranks?
Being a democrat at heart does not mean that one does not know the shortcomings of democracy, especially when it comes to “efficiency” and the claim of representativeness—disenchantment arises as much in “archaeodemocracies” as in “neodemocracies”. But then, one of the things I argue in my latest “academic” paper is that the corporatist outlook of Macao’s political system inherited from the 1980s, despite or because of the liberal context, has become fairly frustrating for a locally engaged, more affluent, more professional and better-educated youth that can but all too easily blame outdated and unsuitable intermediation bodies for all the inadequate public policies catering only for segmented parts of the community. That cost me my job.
Published in Macau Daily Times, July 25th 2014
Friday, July 25, 2014
Friday, July 11, 2014
Kapok: Contentious words
Let’s be clear, from a constitutional point of view there is nothing “illegal” in organizing an informal public consultation aka survey in the form of a mock referendum regarding the Chief Executive selection process. It is however legally “invalid”, as stated by both the Macao SAR government and the Central Government Liaison Office, as it has absolutely no binding effect in law. But is that what really matters?
In the words of the three organizers of this “civil referendum” or “civil society sponsored consultation”, the whole idea is to “give citizens an opportunity to experience the exercise of civil rights and civil liberty”. It is of course highly politically motivated, as this will take place right before the election of the Chief Executive in August, and results will be announced only after the highly probable reappointment of Chui Sai On for a second term. Of the two motions to be discussed, one will concern the possible election of the Chief Executive through universal suffrage in 2019, but the other is definitely targeted at the ongoing process, as this second motion could be either “Do you have confidence in the sole candidate in the Chief Executive Election 2014 [name of the candidate] to become the Chief Executive?” or “Which candidate in the Chief Executive Election 2014 do you favor as the Chief Executive?” In the eyes of the MSAR government, this political stunt is thus clearly seen as a provocation, and the “illegal” characterization can then be understood as a condemnation of a perceived attempt to discredit the official result by resorting to a non-legally binding substitutive method of designation.
Two elements of context have to be kept in mind. The fact that close to 800,000 people participated in a civil referendum at the end of June in Hong Kong to advocate a citizen initiative in the selection process for the candidates who will participate in the Chief Executive elections in 2017. The issue is to say: let’s not transform the promise of “universal suffrage” as enshrined in article 45 of the Hong Kong Basic Law into a meaningless one if the choice of candidates is not to be open. But then, the Hong Kong SAR government can legitimately claim that the sentence preceding that promise takes precedence: the method “shall be specified in the light of the actual situation in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and in accordance with the principle of gradual and orderly progress.” Yet, sponsored by the Occupy Central with Love and Peace, the Hong Kong civil referendum was only concerned with an election to come, and was commissioned to the Public Opinion Programme of The University of Hong Kong and the Centre for Social Policy Studies of the Hong Kong Polytechnic University, thus giving it the “respectability” of both distance in time and academic grounding—can anybody imagine ANY university in Macao engaging in that kind of endeavor?
Well, there was one previously – a survey I ran on the election of the Chief Executive back in early 2009. We found that 51% of our respondents favored “suffrage universal” out of the 4 possible choices. No claim here in being legally binding, but then, neither does it contradict article 47 of the Macao Basic Law: “The Chief Executive of the Macao Special Administrative Region shall be selected by election or through consultations held locally and be appointed by the Central People’s Government.”
Ultimately, from an academic perspective, my questions are: why do like-minded civil groups in Macao have to resort to this kind of “political happening”? In plain English, why is the system so “stuck” that it does not allow for new forms of political participation to emerge? Isn’t it obvious that between the depiction of the 2012 political reform package as having “a positive impact on the maintenance of a stable political system and improved democratic elements in the constitution of Macao” (Macao Yearbook 2013) and the 20,000 people demonstrating on May 25th 2014 against a government-sponsored law regarding a (too) generous retirement scheme for senior officials, there is a growing discrepancy? What is really missing in the Basic Law is not the promise of universal suffrage but the duty to take into account “the actual situation” of Macao. Clearly, the principle of “one position, one candidate” that has been the rule since 2004, although not illegal, is not helping…
Published in Macau Daily Times, July 11th 2014
In the words of the three organizers of this “civil referendum” or “civil society sponsored consultation”, the whole idea is to “give citizens an opportunity to experience the exercise of civil rights and civil liberty”. It is of course highly politically motivated, as this will take place right before the election of the Chief Executive in August, and results will be announced only after the highly probable reappointment of Chui Sai On for a second term. Of the two motions to be discussed, one will concern the possible election of the Chief Executive through universal suffrage in 2019, but the other is definitely targeted at the ongoing process, as this second motion could be either “Do you have confidence in the sole candidate in the Chief Executive Election 2014 [name of the candidate] to become the Chief Executive?” or “Which candidate in the Chief Executive Election 2014 do you favor as the Chief Executive?” In the eyes of the MSAR government, this political stunt is thus clearly seen as a provocation, and the “illegal” characterization can then be understood as a condemnation of a perceived attempt to discredit the official result by resorting to a non-legally binding substitutive method of designation.
Two elements of context have to be kept in mind. The fact that close to 800,000 people participated in a civil referendum at the end of June in Hong Kong to advocate a citizen initiative in the selection process for the candidates who will participate in the Chief Executive elections in 2017. The issue is to say: let’s not transform the promise of “universal suffrage” as enshrined in article 45 of the Hong Kong Basic Law into a meaningless one if the choice of candidates is not to be open. But then, the Hong Kong SAR government can legitimately claim that the sentence preceding that promise takes precedence: the method “shall be specified in the light of the actual situation in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and in accordance with the principle of gradual and orderly progress.” Yet, sponsored by the Occupy Central with Love and Peace, the Hong Kong civil referendum was only concerned with an election to come, and was commissioned to the Public Opinion Programme of The University of Hong Kong and the Centre for Social Policy Studies of the Hong Kong Polytechnic University, thus giving it the “respectability” of both distance in time and academic grounding—can anybody imagine ANY university in Macao engaging in that kind of endeavor?
Well, there was one previously – a survey I ran on the election of the Chief Executive back in early 2009. We found that 51% of our respondents favored “suffrage universal” out of the 4 possible choices. No claim here in being legally binding, but then, neither does it contradict article 47 of the Macao Basic Law: “The Chief Executive of the Macao Special Administrative Region shall be selected by election or through consultations held locally and be appointed by the Central People’s Government.”
Ultimately, from an academic perspective, my questions are: why do like-minded civil groups in Macao have to resort to this kind of “political happening”? In plain English, why is the system so “stuck” that it does not allow for new forms of political participation to emerge? Isn’t it obvious that between the depiction of the 2012 political reform package as having “a positive impact on the maintenance of a stable political system and improved democratic elements in the constitution of Macao” (Macao Yearbook 2013) and the 20,000 people demonstrating on May 25th 2014 against a government-sponsored law regarding a (too) generous retirement scheme for senior officials, there is a growing discrepancy? What is really missing in the Basic Law is not the promise of universal suffrage but the duty to take into account “the actual situation” of Macao. Clearly, the principle of “one position, one candidate” that has been the rule since 2004, although not illegal, is not helping…
Published in Macau Daily Times, July 11th 2014
Friday, June 06, 2014
Kapok: The old regime
If Hong Kong did indeed host “China’s largest 25th anniversary Tiananmen remembrance rally” on June 4th, it was not, contrary to the South China Morning Post's headline, the “only” one on Chinese soil, and nor was it its first ever installment on the southern bank of the Pearl River. What was new though was the fact that it gathered more than 2,000 people in Macao, people who were on the steps of Saint Paul’s façade already in 1989 to demonstrate their dismay in the wake of the repression as well as younger participants, not even born at that time, concurring in the same aspiration to see the official verdict of “counter-revolutionary riot” be reversed. Desires to rectify the master narratives of historical events that are perceived as having been vastly distorted by an official truth are awfully enduring in any human community, and quite understandably so as this is the condition for collective memories to be soothed and united again.
Even though the figures seem pale in comparison with the 180,000 who amassed in Victoria Park on Wednesday evening, the very fact that more than 10 times the usual number of participants assembled in Senado Square, right in the middle of it, next to the fountain and up to the entrance of a popular cosmetics shop, is worthy of careful consideration.
Regarding the location, organizers of the event benefitted from two sets of distinct and yet converging factors: the cancelling of the traditional extravaganza celebrating “Children’s Day” because of the official mourning of one of Macao’s greatest Chinese patriots passing away, and two rulings of the Court of Final Appeal stating that not only did associations organizing the vigil have every right to apply for Senado Square but that the Public Security Police had no ground in deciding to restrict the vigil to the traditional small corner of Senado Square facing Saint Dominic’s Church.
As far as numbers are concerned, it is of course tricky to decide whether the importance of the turnout was mainly due to the particular significance of the 25th anniversary or to a broader social context that had seen some 20,000 Macao citizens, often very young ones, demonstrate on May 25th and again 7,000 on May 27th against a perceivably unjustifiable bill setting in place very generous packages for retiring officials along with unwarranted criminal immunity for the Chief Executive. If one looks at the past for an indication, it is true that the 20th anniversary did mark in Hong Kong a three fold increase between 2008—less than 50,000 people—and 2009—about 150,000. But for Macao, as far as one can remember, there was no such upsurge, as participants back in 2009 were in the 2 to 300, only marginally more numerous than in 2008. Thus, the constant references made by some of the organizers in Macao to the May 25th/27th demonstrations must not be taken lightly, as it is unquestionable that the 2014 June 4th vigil in Macao appears, if not yet as a turning point, at least as a landmark.
Party leaders in China, and especially Wang Qishan, the Politburo Standing Committee member in charge of Party discipline, are reportedly great readers of Tocqueville’s "The Old Regime and the Revolution" and have stressed the paradox that revolutions do not happen when things are worse, but rather when things have just started to change, thus making the need for deeper and yet incremental reforms somehow imperative if unnecessarily violent turmoil is to be avoided. Even if the China Daily says so.
Published in Macau Daily Times, June 6th 2014
Even though the figures seem pale in comparison with the 180,000 who amassed in Victoria Park on Wednesday evening, the very fact that more than 10 times the usual number of participants assembled in Senado Square, right in the middle of it, next to the fountain and up to the entrance of a popular cosmetics shop, is worthy of careful consideration.
Regarding the location, organizers of the event benefitted from two sets of distinct and yet converging factors: the cancelling of the traditional extravaganza celebrating “Children’s Day” because of the official mourning of one of Macao’s greatest Chinese patriots passing away, and two rulings of the Court of Final Appeal stating that not only did associations organizing the vigil have every right to apply for Senado Square but that the Public Security Police had no ground in deciding to restrict the vigil to the traditional small corner of Senado Square facing Saint Dominic’s Church.
As far as numbers are concerned, it is of course tricky to decide whether the importance of the turnout was mainly due to the particular significance of the 25th anniversary or to a broader social context that had seen some 20,000 Macao citizens, often very young ones, demonstrate on May 25th and again 7,000 on May 27th against a perceivably unjustifiable bill setting in place very generous packages for retiring officials along with unwarranted criminal immunity for the Chief Executive. If one looks at the past for an indication, it is true that the 20th anniversary did mark in Hong Kong a three fold increase between 2008—less than 50,000 people—and 2009—about 150,000. But for Macao, as far as one can remember, there was no such upsurge, as participants back in 2009 were in the 2 to 300, only marginally more numerous than in 2008. Thus, the constant references made by some of the organizers in Macao to the May 25th/27th demonstrations must not be taken lightly, as it is unquestionable that the 2014 June 4th vigil in Macao appears, if not yet as a turning point, at least as a landmark.
Party leaders in China, and especially Wang Qishan, the Politburo Standing Committee member in charge of Party discipline, are reportedly great readers of Tocqueville’s "The Old Regime and the Revolution" and have stressed the paradox that revolutions do not happen when things are worse, but rather when things have just started to change, thus making the need for deeper and yet incremental reforms somehow imperative if unnecessarily violent turmoil is to be avoided. Even if the China Daily says so.
Published in Macau Daily Times, June 6th 2014
Monday, May 26, 2014
Kapok: What happens in Macao… doesn’t stay in Macao
The newly revised bill soon to be introduced for a plenary vote at the Legislative Assembly that deals with the benefits granted to the Chief Executive (CE) and the principal officials (the five secretaries, the two commissioners, and the heads of the police and customs) upon leaving their office is creating quite a stir in the community and beyond. The main arguments of the opponents of the bill revolve around three sets of questions: its adequacy with the Basic Law; the amount of these benefits; and issues pertaining to procedural decision-making—in plain English, the absence of a public consultation regarding the matter. But the dispute has now spread beyond the legislative hemicycle: a petition asking for citizens to express their disagreement is claiming several thousand signatures; a Facebook page adorned with a picture of a pig and entitled “Greedy officials’ severance benefits are really excessive” has attracted hundreds of postings, close to 1,500 Likes and been shared more than 1,100 times; and the news has appeared and even made the front page, on May 21st, of the most widely-read Chinese newspaper in Hong Kong, the reputedly pro-Beijing leftist and yet grassroots-oriented Oriental Daily News—one of the titles raising the question whether Macao legislators had paved the way for the creation of a “third system”.
As far as the Basic Law is concerned, the main squabble has to do with the article related to the criminal immunity of the CE, also encapsulated in the bill, and the fact that this would contradict the principle of equality among citizens enshrined in our mini-constitution, especially because the “presidential immunity” that exists in many a place precisely concerns heads of state or prime ministers, whereas the CE can merely be considered has a “super province governor”. Yet, I beg to disagree: one cannot advocate the uniqueness of the second system all year long, and nevertheless diminish the status of the CE: our CE acts and symbolizes our whole political community, and the Basic Law is our constitution. What is missing though are possible derogations in order to waive this immunity, especially vested in the legislature, in case the CE commits acts that can be construed as incompatible with his responsibilities.
In principle, I personally believe and this is the case in many polities around the world, that the highest authority of a community should be entitled to life-long benefits upon retirement from official duty, at least for the sake of integrity and independence of the person who has embodied the whole community, and ultimately because he or she will never cease to represent this community. All benefits in nature (a car with a driver, a guard and an office) seem logical, and of course a revenue has to be included. What has now been decided, retroactively up to the year 2000, is to provide a revenue equivalent to 70% of the CE's monthly remuneration, and this for as long as he or she does not receive a salary from private employment. This corresponds to about MOP189,000 per month—a pretty comfy retirement scheme (a former French president, by comparison, makes MOP57,000 a month). Principal officials would get a one-time lump sum as severance benefit equivalent to 30% of a monthly salary times the number of months in service if not returning to the public sector and only 14% if returning to the public sector. Therefore, a secretary who has served ten years would receive MOP6,743,000 upon leaving office if not returning to the public sector—this is equivalent to 3 years of full salary, whereas, again in France, a former minister will only collect his full salary for 6 months. The amounts are thus pretty impressive, and the timing of the law quite tactless, as the salaries of the CE and principal officials have just increased by 10% in January and the whole administration is lined-up for an important reshuffle at the end of the year.
Would a public consultation help quiet down a growing public anxiety, as advocated by opposition legislators? Possibly, as the matter would at least be opened for discussion. But most surely, what would make a difference is if the president of the legislative commission responsible for the bill could come up with a better explanation than the one openly admitting that amounts and percentages were decided in a “non-scientific” way and because they seemed right. What would also help is if a CE-picked legislator would refrain from declaring that the principal officials even deserve “50%”, instead of the 30% already bumped up from the original 14%. Small circle politics has to be played with sophistication if it vies to elude embarrassment.
Published in Macau Daily Times, May 26th 2014
As far as the Basic Law is concerned, the main squabble has to do with the article related to the criminal immunity of the CE, also encapsulated in the bill, and the fact that this would contradict the principle of equality among citizens enshrined in our mini-constitution, especially because the “presidential immunity” that exists in many a place precisely concerns heads of state or prime ministers, whereas the CE can merely be considered has a “super province governor”. Yet, I beg to disagree: one cannot advocate the uniqueness of the second system all year long, and nevertheless diminish the status of the CE: our CE acts and symbolizes our whole political community, and the Basic Law is our constitution. What is missing though are possible derogations in order to waive this immunity, especially vested in the legislature, in case the CE commits acts that can be construed as incompatible with his responsibilities.
In principle, I personally believe and this is the case in many polities around the world, that the highest authority of a community should be entitled to life-long benefits upon retirement from official duty, at least for the sake of integrity and independence of the person who has embodied the whole community, and ultimately because he or she will never cease to represent this community. All benefits in nature (a car with a driver, a guard and an office) seem logical, and of course a revenue has to be included. What has now been decided, retroactively up to the year 2000, is to provide a revenue equivalent to 70% of the CE's monthly remuneration, and this for as long as he or she does not receive a salary from private employment. This corresponds to about MOP189,000 per month—a pretty comfy retirement scheme (a former French president, by comparison, makes MOP57,000 a month). Principal officials would get a one-time lump sum as severance benefit equivalent to 30% of a monthly salary times the number of months in service if not returning to the public sector and only 14% if returning to the public sector. Therefore, a secretary who has served ten years would receive MOP6,743,000 upon leaving office if not returning to the public sector—this is equivalent to 3 years of full salary, whereas, again in France, a former minister will only collect his full salary for 6 months. The amounts are thus pretty impressive, and the timing of the law quite tactless, as the salaries of the CE and principal officials have just increased by 10% in January and the whole administration is lined-up for an important reshuffle at the end of the year.
Would a public consultation help quiet down a growing public anxiety, as advocated by opposition legislators? Possibly, as the matter would at least be opened for discussion. But most surely, what would make a difference is if the president of the legislative commission responsible for the bill could come up with a better explanation than the one openly admitting that amounts and percentages were decided in a “non-scientific” way and because they seemed right. What would also help is if a CE-picked legislator would refrain from declaring that the principal officials even deserve “50%”, instead of the 30% already bumped up from the original 14%. Small circle politics has to be played with sophistication if it vies to elude embarrassment.
Published in Macau Daily Times, May 26th 2014
Friday, April 18, 2014
Kapok: Swift and resolute
The recently dismissed mayor of Bogota, Gustavo Petro, was absolutely right when he stated that “a developed country is not a place where the poor have cars. It’s where the rich use public transportation.” I am pretty sure our neighbors in Hong Kong, having just been listed ‘best city in the world for commuters’, would beg to disagree: indeed developed countries can have it all—nice cars for those who can afford them and great public transportations for everybody—it just comes at a price.
If Hong Kong tops the list of the 84 cities assessed in the “The Future of Urban Mobility 2.0”, it still underachieves when it comes to the development of cycling paths and is clearly not faring well as far as air quality indicators are concerned. And yet, even in the first installation of the very same report produced by consulting firm Arthur D. Little in 2011, Hong Kong was already No. 1 and its success was seen as resulting from “a well-balanced split between different forms of transport that move people away from individualized motorized transport”—the Octopus card, owned at the time by 95% of citizens, was being deemed the cornerstone of a “well-articulated mobility strategy”.
In 2014 the wording has grown stronger: Hong Kong is now doted with “the most advanced urban mobility system in the world.” Among the key elements of that system: public transport represents 64% of the modal split; the number of vehicles registered per capita is among the lowest amongst the cities surveyed; and the average number of smart cards per citizen reaches 3.1! Residents often own two cards, whereas both cross-border commuters and tourists alike are strongly encouraged to get one. When it comes to “green” drawbacks, things have obviously deteriorated since 2011, apart from cycling paths: transport-related CO2 emissions have doubled in just three years! Hence the adoption of the resolute and ambitious “Clean Air Plan” in March 2013, clearly a pre-condition for cycling paths to be rolled out beyond the New Territories…
What about Macao?
In a previous column, I already stressed the inadequacy of the yearly assessment provided by the Transport Department (DSAT) regarding the setting in motion of the “General Policy on Traffic and Land Transportation in Macao (2010-2020)”—which, back in 2009, lucidly identified the main issues while making some far-reaching, although not mandatory, recommendations. To put it simply, the DSAT report can hardly hide that “too little” is done and “too slow”. Key statistics, like the share of public transport in the modal split, the penetration of smart cards or the cars per capita ratio are simply absent—despite some of these indicators being used in the 2009 consultation document.
The criteria delineated by the Arthur D. Little survey could therefore be of interest: all together, it is some 19 factors divided between “maturity” and “performance” elements that allow for a fruitful comparative perspective. On the “maturity” side, only 2 out of 12 criteria seem to bode well in favor of Macao: the low public transportation fare and the frequency of the busiest transportation lines. But road density is about 7 times more than in Hong Kong and the number of cars per capita at least 2 times more, even if we exclude the 2-wheelers. On the side of “performance”, hardly any criteria seem to have improved based on measurements available in Macao: air indicators are deteriorating; traffic-related fatalities are worsening; the evolution of the share of public transport or zero-emissions means in the modal split are marginally positive; and the mean travel time to work has clearly gotten worse.
While waiting for the LRT to be completed, swift and resolute action seems needed. Even though the “how(s)” would require undoubtedly more than a column to explore, redesigning bus routes and operations might prove useful, while making a better integrated usage of the Macau Pass could help—all parking meters in Hong Kong have been Octopus friendly since 2004. But first things first: let’s improve the assessment criteria!
Published in Macau Daily Times on April 18 2014
If Hong Kong tops the list of the 84 cities assessed in the “The Future of Urban Mobility 2.0”, it still underachieves when it comes to the development of cycling paths and is clearly not faring well as far as air quality indicators are concerned. And yet, even in the first installation of the very same report produced by consulting firm Arthur D. Little in 2011, Hong Kong was already No. 1 and its success was seen as resulting from “a well-balanced split between different forms of transport that move people away from individualized motorized transport”—the Octopus card, owned at the time by 95% of citizens, was being deemed the cornerstone of a “well-articulated mobility strategy”.
In 2014 the wording has grown stronger: Hong Kong is now doted with “the most advanced urban mobility system in the world.” Among the key elements of that system: public transport represents 64% of the modal split; the number of vehicles registered per capita is among the lowest amongst the cities surveyed; and the average number of smart cards per citizen reaches 3.1! Residents often own two cards, whereas both cross-border commuters and tourists alike are strongly encouraged to get one. When it comes to “green” drawbacks, things have obviously deteriorated since 2011, apart from cycling paths: transport-related CO2 emissions have doubled in just three years! Hence the adoption of the resolute and ambitious “Clean Air Plan” in March 2013, clearly a pre-condition for cycling paths to be rolled out beyond the New Territories…
What about Macao?
In a previous column, I already stressed the inadequacy of the yearly assessment provided by the Transport Department (DSAT) regarding the setting in motion of the “General Policy on Traffic and Land Transportation in Macao (2010-2020)”—which, back in 2009, lucidly identified the main issues while making some far-reaching, although not mandatory, recommendations. To put it simply, the DSAT report can hardly hide that “too little” is done and “too slow”. Key statistics, like the share of public transport in the modal split, the penetration of smart cards or the cars per capita ratio are simply absent—despite some of these indicators being used in the 2009 consultation document.
The criteria delineated by the Arthur D. Little survey could therefore be of interest: all together, it is some 19 factors divided between “maturity” and “performance” elements that allow for a fruitful comparative perspective. On the “maturity” side, only 2 out of 12 criteria seem to bode well in favor of Macao: the low public transportation fare and the frequency of the busiest transportation lines. But road density is about 7 times more than in Hong Kong and the number of cars per capita at least 2 times more, even if we exclude the 2-wheelers. On the side of “performance”, hardly any criteria seem to have improved based on measurements available in Macao: air indicators are deteriorating; traffic-related fatalities are worsening; the evolution of the share of public transport or zero-emissions means in the modal split are marginally positive; and the mean travel time to work has clearly gotten worse.
While waiting for the LRT to be completed, swift and resolute action seems needed. Even though the “how(s)” would require undoubtedly more than a column to explore, redesigning bus routes and operations might prove useful, while making a better integrated usage of the Macau Pass could help—all parking meters in Hong Kong have been Octopus friendly since 2004. But first things first: let’s improve the assessment criteria!
Published in Macau Daily Times on April 18 2014
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)