News Analysis: Formidable tasks wait ahead in Edmund Ho's second term

Edmund Ho Hau Wah won the election for a second term as Macao's chief executive on Sunday, amid the public's expectation that Ho would lead the second-term Macao Special Administrative Region (SAR) government to consolidate the economic and social strength of Macao.

Despite the numerical success in economic growth, the second-term Macao SAR government still faces formidable tasks in administrative and judicial reforms, sustainable development of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), solution of the humanresource shortage and renovation of old urban districts.

On top of the agenda will be the administrative and judicial reforms. The SAR government founded upon Macao's return to the motherland in 1999 has undergone a localization of personnel. However, Macao residents are still not fully satisfied with the pace of the reforms.

During Ho's election campaign in the past two weeks, he has solicited various views and opinions regarding issues such as the practice of writing legal documents in Portuguese, the complicated judicatory procedures, the stereotype legislation process and the civil servants system.

In a recent interview with Xinhua, Edmund Ho said that althoughMacao is small in size, the above-mentioned system reforms are still tough since the young government would have to keep in mind the interests of all sides as well as the impacts on the future development of the Macao SAR.

One of the most courageous measures carried out by the first administration of the Macao SAR government was the break of Macao's 40-year-old gaming market monopoly in 2002, which has led to a robust growth in Macao's gross domestic product for three years in a row.

Soon, there followed a hot discussion over the risk of the simplex economy heavily depending on the gaming industry. SME owners complained that the government's efforts in diversifying the economic structure are not adequate enough.

Local economists held that as the government's fiscal income largely comes from the revenue of the gaming and tourism industries, it is important to maintain the momentum of the two pillar sectors, while in the meantime, to bolster the SME development, promote creation of high value-added products, convention business and foreign trade.

In his election platform for the chief executive of the second term, Ho has set forth a new target of improving the city's comprehensive living quality, which has won him a lot of acclaims.

Macao's per-capita GDP amounted to 18,000 US dollars in 2003, which represents a fairly high level in the Asian region. During Ho's election campaign, he promised to use the ample fiscal income to enlarge budgets on education, culture, social welfare, urbanization building so as to comprehensively improve people's living standard.

The job market problem has become a big controversy among economists and even inside the Legislative Council and the SAR government.

Some affirmed that the government should continue to protect the interest of local residents by using administrative means to reduce the competition from importing outside labors to the job market. However, the rival opinion held that the competition could not only solve the big market demand for talents in Macao, but also encourage local residents' career aspiration.

Touching on the hot debate on human resources, Ho said that with the development of the cooperation between Macao and its surrounding regions, there must follow more frequent personnel exchanges and a more smooth flow of labor force.

Under the pre-condition of protecting local employment, the Macao SAR government would help businesses resolve the shortage of professionals and workers by adjusting related regulations on importing human resources, said Ho.