New lease of life for tiny Macau colony

Press, 28 March 1980, Page 12

New lease of life for tiny Macau colony

From a special correspondent in Macau

Five years ago the Portuguese Government asked China if it wanted to take back Macau, its small colony on the south China coast. Peking, refused, saying it would take it, back when the time' and history were right. This month a Governor of Macau paid the first official visit to China for more titan 400 years. The one subject not on his agenda was the constitutional future of the colony. This new lease on Europe's oldest colony in the Far East is principally the result of the “four modernisations” policy of the Peking Government. Like Hong Kong. Britain's colony 40 miles to the east, Macau (population 350,000) serves

Peking's purposes, though in a much smaller way. as a place to earn foreign exchange, to attract tourists and foreign expertise, for Chinese investment to earn good profits, and as a dumping ground for suprlus population. China's interest ' in Macau’s stability is matched in Lisbon. None of the main political parties in Portugal wants to return Macau to China. President Eanes’s personal representative, Almeida y Costa, said that the present and probable future governments in Lisbon have no plans to return Macau. “What we are interested in is a strong., stable administration, with power firmly in Portuguese hands and

without a Parliamentary system. China will need more than 20 years to carry out its development plans; it ton wants peace and stability," he said. Ironic words from a member of a Revolutionary Council that gave up all of Portugal’s vast overseas empire — except for Macau. The result of this new stability is the establishment of full diplomatic relations between China and Portugal and a boom such as Macau has never seen. A record three million tourists went to the colony last year, most to seek relaxation from overcrowded Hong Kong. With hotel occupancy at more than 90 per cent, more rooms are urgently needed. Government approval has been given to 10 projects which will treble the existing number. A new trotting stadium for horse races is due to open this year, at a cost of $26 million. In its 10 square miles Macau already offers to gamblers four casinos open 24 hours a day, greyhound racing, and an indoor stadium for pelota, a game imported complete with players from the Basque region of Spain. On every corner there is a pawn shop for when your money runs out. China benefits handsomely from the boom, through its banks and many trading companies in Macau, plus a share of the greyhound profits (gambling in China is illegal). Macau imports nearly all its food from China, and last year the People’s Republic opened the land border for tourists, both from Macau and overseas, building a safari park, hot springs and seaside resorts to lure more travellers. China has also openedn industrial area bordering

Macau, just as it has done next to Hong Kong, offering cheap land and cheap labour. A dozen firms have sb far set up there. One unwelcome result of the “four modernisations” is the greater freedom of migration China has given to its citizens. Last year 70.000 people entered Macau, legally and illegally; the figure for Hong Kong was 200,000 — added to a population of five million. As a result. Macau is now seriously short of water, electricity and fuel. While asking China to reduce the number of exit permits, the Governor, General Melo Egidio, has also requested more fuel and water. All Macau's water comes from

China thorugh a privately owned Communist firm. So the dramatic increase in the colony’s population benefits China, which alone can supply these shortages, to be paid of course in much needed foreign currency. One of the conditions for Macau’s continuing existence is that, like Hong Kong, it makes no claim to independence or self-government. Macau must continue to be “Chinese territory under Portuguese administration”. One of the reasons for Mr Costa’s visit was to deal with a deamdn for greater powers for the colony’s partially elected legislative assembly. While not ruling it out' formally, Mr Costa said that

the Governor, chosen by Lisbon and not from Portuguese born locally, must have “unequivocal powers.” In so saying, he is addressing Peking rather than the democratic ideals of Portugal’s revolution. Five years ago. Macau seemed to have no future as a colony. Now, in the words of the Portuguese consul in Hong Kong, relations between China and Portugal have never been so good. While Peking continues its present modernisation policy, Macau will be left alone. It. has survived since 1557 by being useful to China; as it continues to be, so will its lease of life be extended. Copyright, London Observer Service.