Friday, November 25, 2011 - Edition no. 1468

Transcription

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Page 29
Public budget
Weekend Guide
Economic growth to
slow down in 2012
• Imported labour boosts
employment: Francis Tam
Page 3
• Press Play
• 39 Steps
• Mouse Click
• World of Bacchus
• ORchitectures
Wastewater treatment plant
Since November 1
• Best of Macau
• What’s On
• Sugar scam turns sour
in French wine region
• Ask the Vet
• World of Wonder
Court turns down
New land premium
‘reasonable’: developers suspension appeal
Page 2
Pages 11-26
1
Page 7
Macau Times
macau daily 澳門每日時報
Tourists, guide clashes
sound the alarm
Recent clashes between tour guides and Chinese holidaymakers have prompted the government to launch a probe into the way local and
Mainland travel agencies organise tours.
The Macau Government Tourist Office (MGTO)
said yesterday that it was called on Wednesday
to resolve a dispute between a group of Mainland
visitors and a local tour guide.
A group of 19 Mainland holidaymakers accused
the tour guide of not providing accommodation
in town, arguing that it was included in the package they had acquired in China.
However, the local guide denied such arrangement, saying that the programme was only for a
day-visit, according to MGTO.
The long dispute made it impossible for the
tourists to cross the border and the agency had
to provide overnight accommodation. At the end
of the day, no complaints were lodged but the
tourism authority said it will keep a close eye
on these kinds of disputes, which are becoming
more common.
According to MGTO, these recent clashes have
been triggered by the lack of communication between Mainland and local travel agencies. The
tourism board is also aware of a new trend, under which Mainland tourists are offered travel
vouchers to Macau when making special purchases.
“We will meet with relevant tourism partners
and travel organisations to discuss this issue,”
MGTO said, adding that it will also inform the
tourism authority of China “to find the most
suitable way to tackle down these new arrangements”.
The package tour sector has been in the public
eye for negative reasons, with several disputes
between Chinese tour groups and local agencies
being recorded this year. The most serious took
place in February when a group of Mainland
tourists were charged with assaulting two local
tour guides.
From August guidelines for travel agencies in
charge of tour groups from mainland China have
come into effect.
®
New land premium
‘reasonable’: developers
by Alexandra Lages
N
ew
development
projects will now be
required to pay 24 to
93 percent more in land premiums as the long-anticipated
new calculation formula came
into effect this month.
But developers and realtors say the policy is reasonable and agree that the new
formula will not hamper the
construction sector, as the
number of new projects has
increased from year to year. A
trend that is likely to continue
in the years to come.
The new calculation formula
has been in effect since November 1. The land premium
has remained unchanged since
2004 and the new rules place
the biggest increase, 93 percent, on plots earmarked for
the construction of residential
towers with more than seven
floors. For smaller residential
buildings the land premium
will grow by 50 percent.
The increase will be smaller
for other usages, with land
premium for commercial
buildings and office towers increasing by 35 and 34 percent,
respectively, from the previous
formula updated in 2007.
Rose Lai Neng, finance and
real estate expert from the
University of Macau, told the
Macau Daily Times that this
adjustment will not be reflected
in the final price of properties.
“There is a point when consumers will not accept a high
price. Given such a sticky
price, the developers will then
have to play around the costs
to work out an acceptable
Developers and realtors say the new land premiums will not hamper the construction
sector, which has seen the number of projects grow from year to year
profit margin, which will be
lower than before,” said Lai.
Lai believes that the market
should be able to adjust itself.
If prices climb because of the
land premium, but consumers
aren’t able to afford such prices, developers might have to
choose to build less luxurious
buildings and reduce profit
margin, she explained.
Smaller developers who cannot find the business profitable will be forced out of the
market, Lai added.
The previously low land premium was out of proportion
relative to the housing prices,
according to the scholar. Lai
is not in line with lawmaker
Au Kam San’s views, who said
that the increase is still very
low compared to the market.
“The government’s decision
is a very positive and reasonable move for the betterment
of the market. The scarce
land should not be allowed to
be used at a low cost to begin
with,” she said.
Cautious investors
President of the Macau Association of Building Contrac-
tors and Developers, Tommy
Lau Veng Seng, agrees with
the scholar. He too believes
that prices will not be affected
and that the adjustment is reasonable.
“In general, it will increase
the costs, but the retail prices
will not be the only item accounting for the costs of the
investment,” said Lau.
“When the property is finished, the developer will study
the market’s demand and
there will be a lot of items to
consider rather than only the
costs. The retail price of the
property will not fully reflect
the increase of the costs.”
As for the construction sector, Lau foresees no problems
ahead. “There are a lot of construction projects being initiated in the second half of this
year, especially for those public housing projects. I believe
that contractors will not be affected,” he said.
In contrast, Jeff Wong, head
of residential of Jones Lang
LaSalle’s Macau branch says
that in the short-term, the increase of the land premium
will make developers more
cautious when they start a new
Chamber of Commerce against terminal change
and capacity to operate for five or
10 years more.
The association said the government should first carry out a study
on the impact the Delta Bridge may
have on the terminal’s traffic flow.
The bridge is due to be ready by
2016, while the construction of the
five new reclaimed project, with a total area of 361 hectares, is expected
to be completed within five years.
The association has joined the
lobby group headed by former
lawmaker and businessman David Chow Kam Fai, who recently
launched a survey to establish exactly what residents want.
Chow, who is the owner of the tour-
Director and Editor-in-Chief:
Rogério Beltrão Coelho ([email protected])
Senior Editor:
Cecília Jorge ([email protected])
Editor:
Tiago Azevedo ([email protected])
Designer Editor:
João Jorge Magalhães ([email protected])
Newsroom:
Alexandra Lages ([email protected]),
Natalie Leung ([email protected]),
Vitor Quintã ([email protected])
Designer:
Lina Franco
Secretary:
Yang Dongxiao ([email protected])
Times
®
The Macau Chamber of Commerce
is not in favour of changing the location of the maritime terminal from
the Outer Harbour to Taipa. The influential association urged the government to postpone any eventual
move until the Hong Kong-ZhuhaiMacau Bridge is built.
Members gathered on Tuesday to
discuss the government-proposed
urban planning for the new reclaimed areas. The first of two proposals suggests moving the Outer
Harbour Ferry Terminal to Taipa,
giving room to a leisure bay area.
However, the Chamber of Commerce argued that the peninsula’s
ferry terminal still has some value
ism and gaming project Fisherman’s
Wharf, has recommended the government build a second ferry terminal in Taipa, instead, as he said that
the Outer Harbour is important to
serve the residents’ needs and the
small and medium sized enterprises.
The Pac On ferry terminal, being
built in Taipa, is due for completion in the second quarter of 2013
and will help to divert part of the
traffic from the Outer Harbour.
In the meantime, the government
has proposed four alternatives for
the peninsula’s Outer Harbour Ferry Terminal, including: relocating
the structure to the southern part
of the artificial island located in
plot A; keeping the structure open
with some renovation works; shutting the terminal altogether and
relying on the future Pac On ferry
terminal; or building a new terminal at the offshore artificial island
that will host the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge border crossing.
Meanwhile, the Chamber of Commerce also proposed better road
connections and transportation
services between the new areas, the
peninsula and Taipa and Coloane
islands. President of the association, Ma Iao Lai stressed during
the meeting that the reclamation
project would contribute greatly to
the development of the city.
Contributors:
Albano Martins, Annabel Jackson, António Espadinha Soares, Eduardo Magalhães, Harry Troy,
Joseph Cheung, Juliet Risdon, Luciana Leitão, Manuel Cardoso (photos), Paulo Coutinho, Sofia
Jesus, Thomas Schmid (Thailand)
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Shek Kiu, Cristina Tavares, Cyril Law, David Brookshaw, Diamantina Coimbra, Diana Massada,
Emilie Tran, Emmanuel Buga Dispo, Eric Sautedé, Geoffrey Churchill, Ian Alabanza, Imelu
Mordeno, Ivo Carneiro, Jacky Ho, Jenny Oliveros Lao, Joao Garrott M. Negreiros, Johnny B
Decatoria, José Alves, José I. Duarte, José Manuel Simões, Karen A. Tagulao, Keith Ip, Leanda Lee,
Michael Lio, Neena Thota, Olukayode Iwaloye, Oswaldo Veiga Jardim, Poon Kiu Tung, Ricardo
Rato, Richard Whitfield, Romulo Alegre, Ruan Du Toit Bester, Susan Pottier
News agencies:
AFP, Lusa, Project Syndicate, Xinhua.
project, because the cost is
now higher.
As for the retail prices, he believes that the market will have
to adjust in this early stage.
“But this is not due to the land
premium revision, but just due
to the supply and demand dynamics of the real estate market,” said Wong.
Wong also suggests the government establish a mechanism to revise the land premium in certain periods of
time to refer to the change of
the market conditions, “rather
that put it at a particular level
without any changing”.
Managing Director of Savills
Limited’s Macau branch,
Franco Liu, also does not expect a big change in the business. “It isn’t so great to affect
the investment sentiment.
The completion time of a residential project is two or three
years at least, so if investors
have a good outlook there will
be no problems and transactions can absorb the costs,” he
said.
Liu stated that the new calculation formula is similar to
Hong Kong’s and is closer to
the real market situation.
Macau’s Chamber of Commerce
argues that the peninsula’s ferry
terminal still has capacity to
operate for at least five more years
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2
Times macau
®
Economic growth to
slow down in 2012
by Vítor Quintã
T
he local economy
will continue growing next year but
more slowly, the secretary
for Economy and Finance
said yesterday at the Legislative Assembly. Macau
will likely be affected by
a human resources shortage and a deceleration in
mainland China, Francis
Tam Pak Yuen conceded.
Last year total wealth
created in Macau – known
as Gross Domestic Product
(GDP) increased by 26.2
percent in real terms to
more than MOP 398,000
per capita, one of the highest in the world.
In the first half of 2011
the local GDP has grown
22.9 percent and the official believes it will maintain double-digit growth
throughout the year.
He said that in 2012 the
gaming and tourism sectors “should continue
growing in a stable way,”
which will see a rise in
service exports, investment and consumption, as
well as “a relatively low”
unemployment rate.
The
local
economy
“might reach a positive
growth throughout the
whole of 2012,” Tam said,
“but within a somewhat
lower range”.
Tam said mainland China’s economy “should
maintain a certain growth
level, even if there is the
possibility of a rhythm deceleration next year”. In
addition, the business environment could turn sour
due to “a potential worldwide economic recession,”
Tam added.
Fujian
opportunities
Meanwhile, stronger cooperation with the HKSAR and Guangdong and
Fujian provinces “will
undoubtedly bring about
bigger opportunities for
the development of the
local economy,” the secretary said.
Next year the Macau
Trade and Investment
Promotion Institute will
open a liaison office in Fuzhou, the capital of Fujian
province, Tam announced.
The office will particularly focus on supporting
businessmen looking to
invest in the West Coast
Economic Zone, namely
on Pingtan Island Experimental Zone and Wuyi
New Area.
However, the official admitted, there will be other
home-grown challenges,
such as “a gap between
supply and demand of human resources” and “persistent inflationary pressure, despite the softening
of its impact”.
Government’s
spokesperson Alexis Tam Chon
Weng said earlier this
month that inflation might
go down soon, since domestic inflation in mainland China cooled last
month.
The challenges will particularly
affect
small
and medium enterprises
(SME), Francis Tam said.
“A part of those companies are still facing serious
difficulties, with some of
them even at risk of shutting down mainly due to a
lack of competitiveness,”
he said.
For instance he promised
to expand the coverage and
flexibility of the Industrial
and Commercial Development Fund. Furthermore,
authorities will study how
to financially help restaurant, retail, tourism and
leisure workers take up
training courses in neighbouring regions.
Despite a slump in textile exports since 2008, industrial productivity has
remained stable in Macau with new products appearing, the secretary for
Economy and Finance said
Staff for SMEs
But Ho Ion Sang criticised the government policy to help SMEs. “There
are too many contradictions, from the difficulty
in hiring non-resident
workers to the six-month
ban,” the lawmaker said.
Tommy Lau Veng Seng
agreed: “Many local people don’t want to work in
lowly, manual jobs. So restaurants for instance have
to reduce working hours
and some SMEs prefer to
close doors,” the lawmaker bemoaned.
SME applications for hiring non-resident workers
“will be dealt with and re-
viewed quickly, thus easing their manpower shortage issues,” Francis Tam
pledged.
The promise was welcomed by Kou Hoi In but
the lawmaker stressed
“there is room for improvement” and the approval of imported labour
quota for SMEs “could be
even more flexible”.
But the lack of workers
is a global problem for the
local economy, Tam conceded, as “the supply of
local human resources is
insufficient”. And Macau’s
recovery from the financial
tsunami has only made this
issue “more worrying, reflected in the acute gap be-
Imported labour boosts employment: Francis Tam
The increase in the number of
non-resident workers has had no
negative impact on the employment of local workers, quite to the
contrary, secretary for Economy
and Finance, Francis Tam Pak
Yuen, said yesterday at the Legislative Assembly.
At the end of September imported
labour in the MSAR reached almost
90,000, a level last seen in early
2009, before the financial tsunami
hit Macau. The number of outside
workers has increased every month
since May 2010 when it was down
to 72,092 and it currently accounts
for more than one quarter of the total labour force.
But “this phenomenon has never
jeopardised the employment opportunities for local citizens nor did
it cause a spike in the territory’s unemployment rate,” Tam stressed.
“On the contrary, there was an
obvious improvement in the employment situation,” he added.
“The number of unemployed also
decreased significantly (…) and citizens’ earnings have been growing
gradually.”
Tam’s speech left a significant
opening for the hiring of more out-
side labour, with the official stressing the need for “a balance between
the importation of non-resident
workers and the employment guarantee for locals”.
According to the new government policy, imported labour
“should benefit an increase of both
the work competitiveness of local
citizens and the territory’s overall
competitiveness,” as well as economic diversification, he said.
Moreover, the hiring of non-resident workers will only be allowed
as long as the local unemployment
rate “remains at a relatively low
level,” the secretary warned. “But
what is a reasonable unemployment level?” lawmaker José Chui
Sai Peng asked.
In the July-September period the
jobless rate was down at 2.6 percent, “a relatively low level,” Francis Tam had said earlier.
And labour importation “should
be controlled within an acceptable
range for local workers,” he added.
The official’s stance in last year’s Policy Address had been more strict. In
fact the Administration reduced imported labour quotas for many companies who had more non-resident than
The imported staff increase ‘has never jeopardised the employment
opportunities for local citizens nor did it cause a spike in the
territory’s unemployment,’ Francis Tam stressed
local staff within the same job type.
The Labour Affairs Bureau director, Shuen Ka Hung, also said if a
company lays off a local employee
without giving a justified reason
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while the non-resident workers
in the same job type remains, the
sacked worker can report the employer to the bureau.
V.Q.
tween supply and demand
in the labour market,” the
secretary said.
The impact has mostly
been felt by “middle-aged
individuals with little education and low competitiveness in getting a job in
comparison with outside
workers,” he said. But
Tam rejected the view that
structural unemployment
is the reason behind most
of the 8,900 jobless.
“These are people who
left a previous job and are
looking for another one or
who finished their studies.
Every year there are new
people joining the labour
market, looking for a first
job,” he explained.
Other measures
for 2012
- Improve business tourism
stimulus plan
- Add new business sectors
to Closer Economic
Partnership Arrangement
with China
- Attract investment
for Hengqin Island
- Launch trial cooperation
project in Nansha
- Assess liberalisation
of sports betting
- Integrate taxpayer
identification data
- Conclude revision of
external trade legislation
- Draft new Financial
System legal system
- Regulation on wage
guarantee fund
- New IPIM office in
Fujian province
- Broaden Industrial
and Commercial Fund
- Mandatory safety cards
for construction staff
- Labour Relations Law
revision
- New law on part-time work
- More powers for
Consumer Council
macau Times
MSAR, Korea liberalise
aviation market
The Macau Civil Aviation Authority and the International Air Transport Division of the Ministry of
Land, Transport and Maritime Affairs of the Republic of Korea, renewed a memorandum of understanding on Tuesday that lifts the number of
airlines that can fly between the two sides, as well
as the ceiling on the capacity.
A new airline will start operations between Macau
and the Korean island of Jeju next month. Eastar
Jet will operate charter fights three times a week,
from December 3 to 31. Low-cost carrier Jin Air
has been operating five weekly flights to Seoul
since last year.
South Korea has been one of Macau’s emerging tourist markets, along with India. In October,
Macau received 27,391 Korean visitors, an increase of 24.9 percent year-on-year.
Residential mortgages
down in third quarter
New approvals of residential mortgage loans dropped
in the three months ended September 30, according
to data from Macau’s Monetary Authority.
New residential mortgage loans approved by
Macau banks fell 41.3 percent quarter-to-quarter
to MOP 6.4 billion, of which 96.1 percent was extended to residents.
When compared with the same period of 2010,
new approvals also dropped by 2.6 percent. The
drop might be related to the measures taken by
the government to cool the real estate market.
At the end of September, the outstanding value
of residential mortgage loans reached MOP 74.3
billion, an increase of 34.8 percent from a year
ago. The resident component made up 92 percent of the total.
Alternatively, after registering an increase in the
previous quarter, newly approved commercial
real estate loans rose further by 61.6 percent
quarter-to-quarter to MOP 14 billion, of which
97.4 percent was granted to residents.
Businesses more
reliant on IT
An increasing number of businesses are relying
on Information Technology (IT) to help their business move forward, according to figures provided
by the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC).
The data shows that the rate of usage of IT in the
business sector stood at 48.7 percent in 2010, up
by 2.4 percent from 2009.
While the usage of IT was at full steam in the gaming sector, the rate of usage in travel agencies
and the service sector was 98.9 and 82.5 percent
respectively. The construction and wholesale and
retail sectors also registered significant progress.
In contrast, the restaurant industry had a rate of
IT usage below 32 percent.
The use of IT is more common in large enterprises
with 100 or more workers, while not even half of
Macau’s small establishments with less than 10 workers use these technologies, according to DSEC.
IFT awards prizes for
occupational skills
A total of 11 awards were handed out on Wednesday as part of the 2011 ‘Macao Occupational
Skills Recognition System’ Gold Pin Competition Award, organised by the Institute for Tourism
Studies (IFT).
The initiative, first launched in 2002, attracted
almost 340 entry-level participants from 29 organisations this year. The competition included
assistant cook, Chinese cook (Cantonese cuisine
and dim sum), bartender, concierge, retail sales
officer, waiter or waitress.
The final of the three rounds of the competition
was held last week with juries formed by over 30
executives from the industry. Winners received a
Gold Pin, MOP 6,000 cash and a scholarship of
MOP 2,000 for training courses.
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Leonardo Dioko on TDM Talk Show
Downward trend in
tourism satisfaction
T
he International Tourism Research Centre
recently revealed its
results for the tourist satisfaction survey in Macau for the
first two quarters of 2011.
Director of the centre – an
independent branch of the
Institute of Tourism Studies –
Leonardo Dioko, announced
that the results show a decline
in tourism satisfaction.
First conducted in 2009,
the survey showed a drop in
tourism satisfaction in 2010
and a smaller but further decline in 2011.
“In 2011, our present score
– and we measure tourism
satisfaction on a scale from
0 to 100 – and bear in mind
that 2011 isn’t over yet, but
we found that we’re scoring at
about 68 out of 100,” he said.
“For 2010 and that’s for
the entire year, we achieved
about 70 and that’s for the
entire year.”
However, Dioko is quick to
mention that though the grading has since dropped compared to last year, it doesn’t
spell the end for Macau’s tourism industry.
“This recent result is not yet
a fail grade but it does raise
a little bit of a concern, it is
lower than the last two years.
It is an indicator that tourism
satisfaction is on the decline
but we’ll see when we get the
full year results as there are
still two quarters to go but the
trend does seem to say that
tourism satisfaction is on the
decline,” said the scholar.
Tricky marketing
The centre collects data for
10 sectors in the tourism industry ranging from transportation to food and beverage
have signed up for before they
visit the SAR.
“Whenever we do market
Macau we have to portray, of
course, the more realistic expectation for visitors so that
they don’t expect so much.”
Performance
not up to par
and Dioko said “these different sectors have very different
characteristics”.
From the results gathered,
he says that tour guides, tour
operators and local attractions have been underperforming whilst the events and
heritage sector have been improving in meeting customer
satisfaction.
Meanwhile, casinos and hotels have been the sectors that
are the most stable in pleasing
visitors.
Dioko attributes these differing satisfaction levels to the
visitor’s expectations.
“Tourism satisfaction has always been about experiences
and obviously visitor satisfaction is influenced by how their
experience in Macau measures
up,” he says.
The International Tourism
Research Centre measures satisfaction in three ways: service
performance, value for money,
expectations.
“If you ask me exactly why
are there ups and downs in
visitor satisfaction well it’s because of these three but main-
ly because of performance,”
remarked Dioko.
“Obviously, if you over-market Macau that raises visitor
expectation a lot and when
they do come here if the performance doesn’t measure up
obviously there will be visitor
dissatisfaction.”
He attributes this feeling
of dissatisfaction to the way
Macau promotes itself overseas.
“It’s very funny, if you promote Macau and you show
pictures that there are no
crowds in Macau but when
you go to the Saint Paul’s
Ruins and there’s thousands
of people, for some tourists
that might not be so satisfying simply because you’re
portraying Macau as a very
peaceful and quiet place and
if visitors come and see the
opposite of that picture then,
yes, there will be dissatisfaction.”
He hopes to see better marketing and promotion initiatives by the government in the
future so that tourists understand and realise what they
Macau tourism industry is a
service-based industry, meaning people form their opinions
based of first impressions, so
for Dioko, quality of service is
most important.
Despite the decline in overall tourism satisfaction, he
believes the “government
doesn’t have complete control
of everything” when it comes
to reversing the situation.
“The burden of improving
satisfaction obviously falls on
the different sectors, the commercial providers of tourism
services,” he said.
“These are the tour guides,
the tour operators, the management of hotels; the drivers
association that operates our
taxis. So the primary burden
rests on them.”
The government, meanwhile,
can’t just rest on its laurels.
Dioko says “they need to create an atmosphere of an excellent service culture”.
“This is important for any
destination. There’s enough
incentive for people to work
but I think what needs to be
created across the board…is
to develop a culture of service
excellence,” he explains.
Dioko goes on to say that this
can be done in many ways, one
of which includes rewarding
people who constantly perform well in their respective
fields by way of an annual accrediting system.
Letters from the readers
Trimby and the Macau Grand Prix
Although I have lost my father to a racing accident, Motor Sports are my passion and the Macau Grand Prix the perfect example of the love I have for racing.
Adding up the years that I’ve worked
for both the Radio and TV with my role
has Official Commentator in Portugueselanguage for the Grand Prix Committee,
I’ve bagged 25 presences with this year’s
58th Macau Grand Prix – the past 12 as
Official Commentator.
For over a year now, and two Grand
Prix editions, I have created, co-developed and co-run a page on facebook
dedicated to the event that it is non-profit
oriented and totally independent – hence
the name Grand Prix Unofficial Support
Group.
It is with this passion of having proudly
worked in 25 editions of the Macau Grand
Prix that I address this letter expressing
my own opinions and views on what has
caught by surprise the people involved in
the motorcycle race, which celebrated its
45th edition this year.
It has been with great frustration and
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sadness that I have learned of Mr Mike
Trimby’s termination of duties and the
way the topic was then brought into the
public arena.
Both Macau Grand Prix Coordinator
João Manuel Costa Antunes and Mike
Trimby agreed on one point: nobody is
irreplaceable. Mr Antunes quoted here in
your newspaper, and Mr Trimby quoted
on last Saturday’s edition of the Hong
Kong paper South China Morning Post
saying “graveyards are filled with people
that thought they were irreplaceable”.
What saddens me the most is to watch
Mr Trimby walk away, but also the fact
that he left a letter behind that casts a
shadow of doubt over a person with responsibilities in the organisation with
which he has worked with for more than
three decades.
Your paper quoted a report from Motorcycle News about a letter that Mr Trimby
“allegedly sent to riders” in which he cites
“problems with a certain member of the
Macau Grand Prix organisation who
clearly does not like me and goes to great
lengths to cause trouble for”.
It is sad that Mr Trimby did not choose
to deal with this matter with the relevant
people, but it is just as serious if indeed
he was subject to any form of non-professional pressures – something that is yet
to be thoroughly explained.
Casting this shadow over the motorcycle event does not bode well for the
future of the Grand Prix and brings none
of the parts to an healthy termination of
contract that could have been as simple
as Mr Trimby put it: “I have never had
a contract with MGPOC that covered
more than one event (...) I have simply
informed them that I do not wish to be
considered for involvement after 2011.”
Alfredo Maria Vaz
Note – The Macau Daily Times gives
its readers the chance to express their
opinions and raise pertinent questions
on local and social issues. The opinions
expressed in this space are of the sole
responsibility of who writes them.
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Times Macau
Political reform
‘doesn’t need
approval’: expert
Photo by Manuel Cardoso
The adjudication of the Macau peninsula wastewater treatment plant will not be suspended, as the Court of Second
Instance overturned an appeal from one of the bidders
Wastewater treatment plant
Court turns down
suspension appeal
T
Photo by Manuel Cardoso
he Court of Second
Instance (TSI) yesterday turned down
an appeal for the suspension of the effect of the
adjudication of the Macau
peninsula
wastewater
treatment plant (ETAR).
The decision comes almost two months after the
new operator took over
the wastewater plant, on
October 1.
The court rejected an appeal
from Indian-Austrian company Va Tech Wabag, which
challenged the Infrastructure
Development Office (GDI)’s
decision to adjudicate the operation of the ETAR in favour
of the consortium headed by
local company CESL Asia,
a source told Macau Daily
Times.
This was the latest development in a process that
has been tinged with controversy since mid-2010, when
the bids for the international tender were opened.
The appeal was lodged after the Court of Final Appeal (TUI) overturned the
exclusion of Va Tech Wabag from the international
public tender for the Areia
Preta infrastructure.
Last month, the top court
accepted the arguments
from the former operator
of the plant, claiming the
commission responsible
for opening tenders made
a “disproportionate” decision in overturning the
bid due to an issue that
was “merely formal and
absolutely harmless”.
The judges ruled that
Wabag had in fact included all the necessary information in the bid, albeit
in another document. “We
don’t see why the bidders
could not present two tables in a single paper, one
in the front and one in the
back,” said the verdict.
“Weighting on the one
hand the merely formal
irregularity (…) and the
benefits of public interest
from having four bidders,
instead of three, (…) it’s
hard to understand the
exclusion of the bidder,
because it’s the administrative bodies’ mission to
pursue the public interest,” the judges added.
Following TUI’s ruling,
Wabag went ahead with
an appeal for the adjudication to be suspended,
which the TSI turned
down yesterday.
But in a move that has
caught many of the people involved by surprise,
the tender commission
decided to open Wabag’s
proposal today. A decision
that has left people wondering what the outcome
would be, given that a new
company is already operating the plant.
There is another pending
process that involves the
Sino-Belgium consortium
led by Waterleau.
Last month, the Court
of Second Instance overturned the exclusion of Waterleau from the international public tender for the
modernisation, operation
and maintenance of the
Areia Preta infrastructure.
However, GDI has not
confirmed whether or not
it lodged an appeal with
TUI. Even if the Court
of Final Appeal upholds
TSI’s decision, both verdicts may be purely academic as the new consortium has begun operating
the wastewater plant in a
five-year contract worth
some MOP 600 million.
Considering that reopening the public tender or
launching a new one seems
unlikely, the way out for
both companies could be
to clinch an agreement
with the government on
financial compensation.
T.A.
PETA takes to Senado Square
these animals are treated”.
“It’s a fun and provocative way
to get a very important message
across,” she said, not only to local residents but also to the thousands of tourists who visit the territory everyday.
PETA claims millions of animals such as snakes and lizards
are poached and killed with “unspeakable cruelty” so that their
skins can be made into boots,
belts, handbags, shoes and other
fashion items.
Ashley Fruno, from the People for the
Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA),
took her protest to Senado Square yesterday, demonstrating against the use
of exotic-animal skins.
Fruno had her body painted to look
like snakeskin, while holding a sign
that reads ‘Animals suffer for exotic
skins’.
“Macau is a very fashion-conscious
area so we think it’s very important to
stage this protest here,” Fruno had told
Macau Daily Times. The goal was “to
let people know the cruel way in which
7
®
Macau does not need the Central Government to
green light the reform of its political system, said
legal expert António Katchi.
Referring to the SAR’s top official’s recent comments stating that Macau’s political reform first
requires Beijing’s approval, Katchi stressed that
the political reform “doesn’t need approval”,
rather that Beijing wants to avoid unpleasant
surprises.
He added that the Chief Executive’s promise to
launch the reform of the political system is nothing more than a “cosmetic attempt” to show that
something is being done.
The Chief Executive Fernando Chui Sai On announced in his 2012 Policy Address that the government will launch a public consultation in order to introduce changes to the methods of the
election of the Legislative Assembly and the Chief
Executive.
Chui has requested an opinion from Beijing on
how it should amend legislation on political reform. The letter, sent to Standing Committee of
China’s National People’s Congress (NPC) last
week, is on how the Legislative Assembly and the
Chief Executive should be chosen in 2013 and
2014, respectively.
“It seems that the Macau Government is trying
to follow the footsteps of Hong Kong, including a
procedure that I think would not be necessary,”
Katchi said, quoted by the Portuguese news agency Lusa.
He said that the Basic Law “only requires the
NPC to intervene at the end of the legislative revision procedure”. In other words, Macau should
first amend the laws and only then send them to
the NPC.
According to the Basic Law appendixes, any
amendment in the method for selecting the Chief
Executive or the legislature must be made with
the endorsement of a two-thirds majority of all
the members of the Legislative Assembly and the
consent of the top-government official.
Only then shall they be reported to the Standing
Committee of the NPC for recording purposes in the
case of the Legislative Assembly and for approval
in what regards the Chief Executive election.
However, Katchi believes that the Central Government has made it a sine qua non condition
to be consulted first, as was the case for Hong
Kong.
“Beijing wants to have much more control of
the process than what is stated in the Basic Law,
because they don’t want to be surprised with a
bill that goes further than what they expect,” he
said.
While changes in the election of the Chief Executive have to be approved by Beijing, the ones
for the election of lawmakers “have only to be reported,” he recalled.
Thus, Katchi believes that the Central Government wants to be the one to have the final word
before the revision goes ahead. “Obviously it
[Beijing] doesn’t want to be confronted with a
law that cannot be changed in the aftermath.”
Certain that Macau will get the approval to proceed with the reform, Katchi doubts the outcome.
“These will only be cosmetic changes,” he said,
adding that the Macau Government wants “to
give the idea that it is moving towards a more
open and democratic system”.
He also said that Macau and Hong Kong will
hardly get a political system similar to other
democratic countries, considering that the two
regions are under “a one-party regime”.
china Times
®
1,000 strike
at Apple supplier
About 1,000 workers at a plant in southern China
that makes components for Apple and IBM went
on strike this week, a rights group said, the latest
in a string of labour disputes in the country.
Hundreds of police officers, some in riot gear, deployed after staff at the factory in the manufacturing hub of Shenzhen walked out on Tuesday and
blocked a highway to protest long working hours,
China Labour Watch said.
Staff at the plant commonly worked 100 to 120
hours of overtime a month and said they also suffered a high rate of workplace injuries, mass layoffs of older workers and frequent verbal abuse by
managers, the US-based group said.
The plant, which employs 3,000 people in the
Pearl River Delta – home to millions of Chinese
migrant workers – is owned by Taiwan’s Jingyuan
Computer Group, which supplies components to
Apple and IBM.
The strike ended after the company promised to
reduce the amount of overtime, the rights organisation said in a statement. No one at the factory
could immediately be reached for comment.
It was the latest in a recent spate of worker action
in China, where strikes have historically been relatively rare as the country lacks truly independent
trade unions.
More than 400 female workers at a bra factory in
Shenzhen, which borders Hong Kong, cut off the
power and downed tools this week after a manager told one to “jump off a roof and go to hell”.
And last week, more than 7,000 workers at a factory in nearby Dongguan making New Balance, Adidas and Nike shoes went on strike, clashing with
police in a protest over layoffs and wage cuts.
Tibetan clergy gets
social security
China will start paying pensions to monks and nuns
in its Tibetan areas, the official Xinhua news agency
said yesterday, after a run of self-immolations by
Buddhist clergy protesting religious repression.
Beijing has come under mounting international
criticism over its treatment of Tibetan Buddhists in
recent months, with US Secretary of State Hillary
Clinton calling on China to “embrace a different
path”.
Eleven monks and nuns have set fire to themselves
this year in what rights groups say is a sign of the
desperation felt by Tibetan Buddhists in China,
where some have been subjected to religious “reeducation.”
China, which has invested heavily in development
in its ethnically Tibetan regions, maintains that it
has brought modernisation and a better standard
of living.
Yesterday, Xinhua said that from next year, monks
and nuns over the age of 60 in Tibetan-inhabited
regions would receive 120 yuan (about USD 19) a
month in retirement pay.
Beginning next year, they will also be able to buy
basic medical insurance for 60 yuan a year, which
will cover 50,000 yuan per person per year in medical expenses, it added.
Previously, many monks and nuns were not allowed to participate in a national social security programme currently being implemented at the township-level across the nation, press reports said.
“It’s a major approach to improve Tibetan people’s
livelihood,” Xinhua quoted Wu Yingjie, deputy Communist Party secretary of the Tibet Autonomous
Region, as saying.
The move is aimed at protecting the rights of monks
and nuns by extending public services to their monasteries, he said.
The scheme extends to southwest China’s Sichuan
province, where there were 11 self-immolations.
Last year, the People’s Daily reported that there
were 46,000 Tibetan Buddhist monks and nuns
in Tibet, with fewer than 3,000 of them over the
age of 60.
Navy to carry out
Pacific exercises
by Sebastien Blanc
C
hina has said it will
conduct “routine” naval exercises in the
Pacific Ocean, in the week
after a major diplomatic
campaign by US President
Barack Obama to assert the
United States as a Pacific
power.
The defence ministry said
the exercises, to be held later this month, did not target
any particular country, but
the announcement comes
against a background of
growing tensions over maritime disputes in the AsiaPacific region.
Obama, who has dubbed
himself America’s first Pacific president, said last week
the US would deploy up to
2,500 Marines to Australia
and tighten air force cooperation, a move seen as a
response to China’s growing
regional might.
China’s freedom of navigation “shall not be subject
to any form of hindrance”,
the defence ministry said
in a brief statement late
Wednesday announcing the
naval exercises in the western Pacific.
“This is a routine drill arranged under an annual
plan, does not target any
particular country or target,
and complies with relevant
international laws and international practice,” it added.
Obama flew home Saturday
after a seven-day tour of Pacific nations during which he
took in a trio of summits and
announced greater military
involvement in the region.
“Here is what this region
must know. As we end today’s wars, I have directed
my national security team
to make our presence and
missions in the Asia-Pacific
a top priority,” the US president announced during a
visit to Australia.
Washington’s new diplomatic campaign to assert
itself as a Pacific power has
alarmed China, which sees
initiatives like stationing Marines in Australia as intruding
into its sphere of influence.
China’s Premier Wen Jiabao has warned against
interference by “external
forces” in regional territorial disputes including in
the South China Sea, a strategic and resource-rich area
where several nations have
overlapping claims.
China claims all of the maritime area, as does Taiwan,
while four Southeast Asian
countries declare ownership
of parts of it, with Vietnam
and the Philippines accusing
Chinese forces of increasing
aggression there.
The competing claims have
led to periodic outbreaks
of tension between China
and its neighbours in recent
years, including with the
Philippines and Vietnam in
recent months, and with Ja-
pan in late 2010.
China’s People’s Liberation Army, the largest armed
force in the world, is primarily a land force, but its navy
is playing an increasingly
important role as Beijing
grows more assertive about
its territorial claims.
Earlier this year, the Pentagon warned that Beijing was
increasingly focused on its
naval power and had invested in high-tech weaponry
that would extend its reach
in the Pacific and beyond.
Recent trials of China’s
first aircraft carrier underlined the scale of Beijing’s
naval ambitions, sparking
jitters in the United States
and Japan.
China, which publicly announced around 50 separate
naval exercises in the seas
off its coast over the past
two years – usually after the
event – says its military is
only focused on defending
the country’s territory.
Arthur Ding, a Taiwanbased expert on the PLA,
said China’s navy conducted
regular drills in the western
Sichuan road accident kills 17
A farm vehicle in water at the traffic accident spot in Egu township of
Yajiang County, yesterday
Seventeen people died and two others were injured in a traffic accident in
a remote part of China’s Sichuan province, state media reported.
The “major” accident involved a “farm
vehicle” with 19 people on board, and
took place in Egu in Yajiang county at
8
about 1:35pm (0435 GMT) on Wednesday, the state-run Xinhua news agency
reported, citing the Sichuan Provincial
Work Safety Bureau.
The injured were rushed to hospital in
Yajiang, the report said, without giving
further details of the accident, which
Pacific, but that the timing
of the latest announcement
could be significant.
“We need to watch what
kind of military exercise this
fleet is executing. If it is a
simple tactical drill, it can be
said that this exercise aims
to protest President Obama’s
recent statement, because it
takes time to prepare a real
exercise,” he told AFP.
China’s official comments
on Obama’s trip were muted,
but state news agency Xinhua said Asian suspicions
would be raised by the plan
to base troops in Australia
and by US Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton’s declaration
that the 21st century will be
“America’s Pacific century”.
“If the US sticks to its Cold
War mentality and continues to engage with Asian
nations in a self-assertive
way, it is doomed to incur
repulsion in the region,” the
agency said.
“The hard fact is that the
Pacific Ocean belongs to all
countries sharing its shores,
not just the United States.”
AFP
is now under investigation by local authorities.
The deaths follow a bus crash a week
ago in which 20 people, 18 of them
children, were killed when a hugely
overloaded school bus collided headon with a truck in Gansu province in
northwestern China.
Some 64 children had been crammed
into a nine-seater bus with its seats removed, state media said. The tragedy
prompted authorities to order checks
on school transport across the country,
where road accidents are frequent.
Almost 70,000 pople died in road
accidents in China in 2010, or about
190 fatalities a day, according to police
statistics – down from nearly 99,000
deaths on the roads in 2005.
But a World Health Organisation
study challenged the 2010 numbers,
saying the deaths listed by local authorities added up to almost double those
figures.
The study said that road accidents
had in fact increased in recent years as
China’s auto market has boomed.
Times asia-pacific
Malaysia lifts security
law, student politics ban
M
alaysian
Prime
Minister
Najib
Razak repealed another security law yesterday,
setting the stage for thousands detained without trial
to be freed or face criminal
charges.
He also pledged to lift a
student politics ban in line
with promises to expand
civil liberties ahead of polls
widely expected to be called
within months.
Najib has been scrapping
or amending a range of decades-old laws criticised as
oppressive and outdated in
an attempt to win back voters, who dealt the government its worst election results ever three years ago.
Opposition leaders and
activists claim the reform
pledges are election ploys,
which do not herald any real
change.
“All our moves are the result of the government’s
respect for the people’s aspirations and listening and
responding to the pulse of
the people,” Najib told parliament in a rare televised
address.
“It is not cheap rhetoric or
false promises; it is one of
taking a brave moral stand.”
Najib said the government
was withdrawing three emergency declarations, which
allow for detention without
trial and date back to racial
riots in 1969, saying they
were no longer relevant.
“The repeal will not affect
the government’s ability to
prevent crime or any other
matter that may threaten
the security or the economy
or public safety,” he said,
adding that the declarations would expire within six
months, giving authorities
until then to either charge or
free those held.
‘All our moves are the result of the government’s respect for the people’s aspirations
[…] responding to the pulse of the people’: Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak
Police say more than 700
people were detained under
the Emergency Ordinance
law in the first eight months
of this year. Some 6,000
were held last year, according to a UN Human Rights
Council report.
Home Minister Hishammuddin Hussein was quoted
by the national news agency
Bernama as saying that 36
detainees would be released
soon but gave no further details.
Activists have long lobbied
for the law to be abolished,
saying it is increasingly used
to hold suspected petty criminals without due process.
An opposition lawmaker
was briefly detained under
the law earlier this year.
Senior opposition lawmaker Lim Kit Siang dismissed Najib’s latest announcements as “election
motivated”.
“Whether he is prepared
to walk the talk is still to be
tested,” he told AFP. “This
should all have been repealed three, four decades
ago.”
In his address, Najib also
said he would amend a provision forbidding students
from participating in politics, which critics say stifles
academic freedom.
He said students above the
age of 21 would be allowed
to join political parties “to
respect the rights of undergraduates”.
He also defended a proposed new law, the Peaceful
Assembly Bill, that the opposition says cracks down on
the right to peaceful protest
rather than safeguarding it
by banning street demonstrations.
Najib’s coalition has ruled
Malaysia since independence in 1957, often with an
iron fist.
But yielding to increasing
demands for greater civil
liberties and trying to regain
support, Najib has promised
to break with the country’s
authoritarian past.
Nalini Elumalai, a representative of local human
rights group Suaram, said
Najib should provide further details for the legal
changes.
“We question the sincerity of the government,” she
told AFP. “They have been
so secretive all the while.
We hope they won’t come
out with new bills... that are
repressive.”
Earlier this month, police
detained 13 suspected militants on Borneo island under the Internal Security Act
(ISA), which also allows detention without trial and Najib has pledged to repeal.
Critics say the fresh arrests
under the security act undermined Najib’s promise
to do away with it. The government says the detentions
were necessary to protect the
country’s security.
S.Lanka census of war deaths: ‘too small’
Sri Lankan Defence Ministry Secretary
Gotabhaya Rajapakse addresses a
seminar in Colombo yesterday
Sri Lanka’s defence secretary said
yesterday a census would reveal the
civilian deaths in the final battle of the
country’s civil war, but the number
would be “far too small” to constitute
war crimes.
Gotabhaya Rajapakse, the president’s
brother, said the results were being
finalised for the census carried out in
the northeast of the country by civil
servants drawn from the ethnic Tamil
community there.
International rights groups claim
that up to 40,000 perished in the final
months of fighting which ended in May
2009, with the military also accused of
shelling hospitals and “no-fire zones”
demarcated for civilians.
“As a result of the census, we already
know that the real number of dead and
missing is far too small to provide any
substance to the absurd allegations of
genocide and war crimes that have been
made against our military,” he said.
People had been asked about deaths
that occurred due to military action, he
said. “It is only for the deaths of people
in this last category that the Sri Lankan
military can bear any responsibility.”
He told a seminar on reconciliation
in Colombo that the allegations were
made by the “rump” of the rebel Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE)
whose leadership was wiped out in a
no-holds-barred military campaign.
The authorities had earlier insisted
that not a single civilian was killed by
government troops while battling Tamil Tigers who lead a decades-long campaign for an independent homeland for
the island’s ethnic Tamil minority.
Rajapakse conceded, however, that
the a rapid expansion of the Sri Lankan
military may have allowed a “few individuals who lacked the capacity to withstand the pressures of warfare with the
required composure.”
“This is not a very unusual thing
in warfare, and there have been unfortunate examples of excesses by
individuals in each and every war
that has been fought, whether in the
World Wars, Vietnam, Afghanistan
or Iraq,” he said .
9
®
Myanmar parliament
passes protest bill
Myanmar’s military-dominated parliament has passed
a bill allowing citizens to protest peacefully, a lawmaker
said yesterday – the latest in a rapid series of reformist
moves in the isolated country.
The bill, which needs to be signed off by President Thein
Sein to become law, requires that demonstrators “inform
the authorities five days in advance,” said upper house
member Aye Maung, of the Rakhine Nationalities Development Party.
Protesters would be allowed to hold flags and party symbols but must avoid government buildings, schools, hospitals and embassies, he told AFP.
The bill came before parliament this week, four years after a mass monk-led protest known as the “Saffron Revolution” was brutally quashed, with the deaths of at least
31 people and the arrest of hundreds of monks, many still
locked up.
Myanmar’s new parliament, dominated by army proxies,
opened in January after nearly five decades of outright military rule following an election in November – the first in 20
years – that was dismissed by many observers as a sham.
The new leaders of the country, which is subject to Western sanctions, have surprised observers with a number of
reformist steps in an apparent move to end international
isolation.
They have freed and held direct talks with long-detained
democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, halted work on an
unpopular dam project that was backed by key ally China,
eased media censorship and passed a law giving workers
the right to strike.
The government also held peace talks at the weekend
with ethnic minority rebel groups who have been waging
a violent insurgency for greater rights and autonomy for
decades.
Suu Kyi’s opposition party announced its return to the
official political arena last week after it boycotted last
year’s polls.
The freeing of all of the country’s political prisoners,
whose exact numbers remain unclear, remains one of the
major demands of Western nations.
A small group of monks risked a rare two-day protest in
Myanmar earlier this month, calling for the prisoners’ release as well as freedom of speech for monks and an end to
conflicts between the army and ethnic minority groups.
Japan in talks to
resume Myanmar aid
Japan and Myanmar will hold a meeting in Naypyidaw
next week to discuss resuming Tokyo’s official development aid, a foreign ministry official said yesterday.
The move is the latest in a series of international overtures that appear to be designed to welcome the isolated
nation in from the diplomatic cold.
Tokyo has continued to provide humanitarian and emergency aid to the country, but halted regular economic assistance in 2003 following the arrest and subsequent detention of democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
“There has been some development in the political situation in Myanmar since Suu Kyi’s release last year,” said a
Japanese foreign ministry official.
At the meeting to be held on Monday, the first since
2003, officials from the two countries will discuss resuming Japan’s aid to Myanmar to the level before the suspension, the official said.
“One thing they are expected to discuss is the reasonability of resuming the construction work on a hydropower
plant,” the official said on the customary condition of anonymity.
“Japan has told Myanmar that we are ready to restart
the work, but on-the-ground research would be necessary
because of the time that has elapsed since the work was
stopped.”
Unlike major Western nations, Japan has maintained
trade ties and dialogue with Myanmar, warning that a hard
line approach could push it closer to neighbouring China,
its main political supporter and commercial partner.
The international community has begun in recent
months to re-engage with the country.
asia-pacific Times
Asia cooperation on
euro crisis impact: Japan
Japan’s fiscal policy minister said yesterday the government wants to cooperate with other Asian nations
to minimise the possible impact of European debt crisis contagion denting the region.
“We’d like to aggressively seek cooperation with
Asian partners, and expanding our currency swap
deal with Korea is a good example,” Motohisa Furukawa, state minister of economic and fiscal policy,
said at a seminar in Tokyo.
South Korea and Japan agreed in October to expand
their currency swap arrangement to the equivalent
of USD 70 billion from USD 13 billion in the face of
global uncertainty, and to revive efforts to reach a
free trade pact.
The deal was seen to help ease market volatility as
the deepening eurozone crisis plagues global markets.
Furukawa will visit Seoul this weekend to discuss
energy and economic issues with his Korean counterparts.
His comments come in the wake of assessments
from the Bank of Japan and the Japanese government over the threat to growth posed by fallout
from the eurozone debt crisis and slowing global demand.
Bank of Japan Governor Masaaki Shirakawa was
quoted by government officials as saying that Japan
should prepare for possible major shocks from Europe, at a meeting of economy-related ministers on
Thursday.
He noted “how to respond to large tsunamis from
overseas would be crucial” for the stability of the Japanese economy, the officials cited him as saying.
On a visit to Japan earlier this month, International Monetary Fund managing director Christine
Lagarde warned: “No country is immune to the current crisis.”
She said the global nature of trade and finance
made them “conductors of crisis contagion” and
that Japan would be hit if its export destinations
faced difficulties.
Market volatility stemming from the crisis has
buoyed demand for the safe-haven Japanese yen,
whose strength also poses risks to the economy.
Japan remains under domestic pressure to do more
to weaken the currency, which erodes repatriated
profits of Japan’s exporters and makes their goods
less competitive, forcing more firms to consider moving production overseas.
Corruption protester
slaps Indian minister
A demonstrator slapped Indian Agriculture Minister
Sharad Pawar, who is also president of the International Cricket Council, in the face yesterday in a protest
against corruption.
The attacker landed a blow on Pawar’s cheek before
being pulled away by security staff. He then brandished
a small knife as he shouted insults at the minister, who
was unhurt by the assault.
“You are all corrupt... People are fed up,” the man said,
adding that the Indian government must adopt a tough
anti-graft law being considered by lawmakers.
The same attacker, who was detained by police yesterday, had on Saturday assaulted a former minister in a
court in New Delhi after a judge handed down a fiveyear prison term to the politician over a 1996 corruption
case.
Other Indian politicians have also recently had shoes
thrown at them.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh “strongly condemned” the assault.
“The prime minister regrets the increasing tendency
to take recourse to violent means to express disagreement,” a statement from his office said.
®
High winds fan
Australian bushfire
H
ot, dry conditions and
high winds yesterday
hampered fire crews
as they battled to control bushfires raging through parched
Western Australia state, destroying around 30 homes.
The first blaze erupted when
a controlled burn-off in a national park near the Margaret
River wine belt got out of hand,
swept across 2,400 hectares
and forced hundreds of people
to evacuate.
An estimated 30 houses and
holiday chalets were razed or
damaged, according to Western Australia’s Department of
Environment and Conservation (DEC).
Firefighters worked through
Wednesday night and appeared to be containing the
fierce blaze in the coastal town
of Prevelly, about 280 kilometres (170 miles) south of Perth.
But strong winds again began fanning the flames, with
some 200 residents who spent
the night on the beach or in an
emergency evacuation shelter
no closer to returning home
and new properties erupting
into flames.
Fifty-five people stranded
near Prevelly had to be rescued
by jetski and ferried to search
and rescue craft offshore with
Firefighters yesterday battle a breakout in mopping up
operations after a bush fire swept through the town of
Margaret River in Western Australia
no other way to escape.
A second fire raged at Denmark, south of the Margaret
River region, with authorities
warning there was a “threat to
lives and homes”.
“You are in danger and need
to act immediately to survive,”
DEC said.
DEC incident controller Roger Armstrong warned Prevelly
residents that conditions were
still dangerous, with gusts
causing some “fairly serious
setbacks” for fire crews.
“It is not controlled and with
hot north-westerly winds there
is still a significant risk of escape,” Armstrong told a community meeting, according to
ABC radio.
In a statement, the DEC late
yesterday said conditions appeared to be easing but “homes
are still at risk of being damaged by the fire”.
Residents in a number of
areas were warned that it was
too late to evacuate and they
should “take shelter in your
home and actively defend it”.
DEC said the burn-off
started on September 6 and
the disaster happened after
winds picked up an ember
and carried it over the controlled burn boundary.
“I want to reinforce with you
that we did not ignite a prescribed burn on a serious fire
danger day,” Armstrong said.
State Premier Colin Barnett
defended the practice of controlled burning, but acknowledged many in the community
were angry.
“It is a preventative measure – this time it’s gone
wrong,” he said.
No deaths or injuries have
been reported but the local
community were venting
their anger.
The fire came as temperatures around the state rose and
the Fire and Emergency Services Authority warned Western Australia was facing one
of its most dangerous bushfire
seasons in recent history.
Bushfires are a regular summer feature in Australia where
in February 2009 the deadly
“Black Saturday” firestorm
claimed 173 lives in southeastern Victoria state – the nation’s
worst natural disaster of modern times.
Indian cabinet mulls retail revolution
An Indian Sikh worker cleans a section of cups inside the country’s first
ever Bharti Wal-Mart “Best Price” Wholesale cash and carry store in
Manawala, some 11 kms from Amritsar (File photo)
India’s cabinet was due yesterday to
consider a plan to open the nation’s
vast retail sector to global supermarket
chains such as Wal-Mart in a reform
that could herald a consumer revolution.
Foreign multinationals have lobbied for years to be able to sell directly
to consumers in the world’s second
most populous nation, seeking access
to a market estimated by consultancy
McKinsey to be worth USD 450 billion
a year.
“If this proposal gets through, consumers will have many more choices
– it will truly be a borderless world in
terms of products available,” Gibson
Vedamani, board member of the Retailers Association of India, told AFP.
The proposal to relax the investment
retail rules was set to be discussed at a
cabinet meeting at 1230 GMT, a government official said.
Supporters see the opening up of the
retail market to foreign players as a way
to increase efficiency in the food supply
chain, reducing prices and easing inflation, which is now close to 10 percent.
10
The full-scale entry of western retail chains could revamp storage
and transport methods, reducing
a chronic problem of food spoilage
and ensuring fresher products are
available.
Critics worry, however, that big, airconditioned stores will drive small
family-owned stores out of business,
despite assurances from industry figures that the market is big enough to
embrace all players.
“If they let in the multinationals, what
will Indian shopkeepers do? They are
big and they will undercut us in price,”
said Chitan Vashisht, 27, who works
at his cramped family-owned grocery
store in New Delhi.
“I don’t want them to be allowed in.”
Even if the corruption-plagued and
weakened cabinet led by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh approves the
change, dissenting voices within his
ruling coalition could scupper the
plan.
The proposal is “a tool to kill the domestic [retail] industry,” said Murli
Manohar Joshi, a leader of the main
opposition Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
“If foreign direct investment in the retail sector is allowed, small traders will
lose their jobs as their products will not
be able to compete.”
Multi-brand foreign groups such as
US-based Wal-Mart currently operate as wholesalers in India but are
prevented from selling directly to the
public. The vast majority of consumers
currently shop at small local markets.
Wal-Mart and France’s Carrefour,
which are seeking entry into India to
grow their revenues in the face of saturated domestic markets, both declined
to comment yesterday ahead of the
cabinet meeting.
Last year, Raj Jain, chief of WalMart’s India operations, said the US
giant could open hundreds of stores in
the country after reform.
The policy change would enable
multi-brand foreign groups to own
51-percent of partnerships with local
firms.
The Congress-led central government
may also raise the foreign investment
cap to 100 percent from 51 percent at
present for single brand retail operations such as Gucci, Nokia or Reebok.
India’s chain retail industry, which
has been pushing hard for the changes,
is cheering the government on from
the sidelines, anticipating lucrative tieups with foreign firms.
“It will enable a lot of companies to
get into India,” Vedamani, of the Retailers Association of India, told AFP.
To ease opposition, the cabinet was
reported to be preparing to stipulate
that foreign retailers must source a
minimum percentage of products –
expected to be around 30 percent –
from small and medium-sized Indian
businesses.
Weekend Guide
Times
1st
Family Times, by Tang Chan Seng 鄧俊成
Macau’s
Precious
Moments
Photo:Courtesy of GCS
Good
Sponsored by
– photography, at the Lou Lim Ioc
2nd
Get Ahead of the Others, by
Cheong Chan Hong 張振鴻
3rd
Dusk, by Tam Mou Wa 譚務華
Winners of “Precious Moments
in Macao” Photo Competition 2011
F
ifty-three selected photos among
some 800 entries submitted by 119 local photographers are being displayed
from this Saturday, 26 November till
2 December at the Lou Lim Ioc Garden for all
photography lovers.
“Precious Moments in Macau 2011” opens officially today with an award-handing ceremony,
and showcases the winning works of the photo
contest the Government Information Bureau
(GCS) has organised every year since 2004 to
“leave a trail of images marking Macau’s development since its return to Chinese rule.”
Works were evaluated in four rounds by a jury
that included members from eight photographic
and four media associations besides the GCS.
From 9 am till 9 pm, during a week, there will
be a chance to admire images bearing “witness
to Macau’s ever-changing skyline, its rich cultural heritage and renewed urban vibrancy, as
well as a sense of Macau’s people’s kindness,
serenity and simplicity,” as the GCS says.
Opening ceremony and awards presentation
take place today, at 6:30 pm
11
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2525
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2011
Friday
November
2011
Press Play
TDM
Friday
by MC LA
Progressive Rock Kate Bush
- 50 Words For Snow (Fish People, 2011)
From Dusk Till Down
23:30
Friday
13:00
TDM News (Repeted)
13:30
News at 24H (RTPi) Delayed Broadcast
15:00
Policy Adress 2012 - Economy and Finance (Live)
20:00
That 70’s Show
20:30
Main News, Financial & Weather Report
21:00
The Promess of Dr. Ho
22:15
Soap Opera
23:00
TDM News
23:30
From Dusk Till Down
01:20
Main News, Financial & Weather Report (Repeted)
01:50
RTPi Live
Saturday
11:00
11:30
12:00
12:30
13:00
13:30
14:30
17:50
18:40
20:00
20:30
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00:20
02:30
03:00
Oggy
Sandokan - The Two Tigers
Zig Zag
Cooking
TDM News (Repeated)
News at 24H (RTPi)
Delayed Broadcast
Soap Opera
Contest
Young Adult Program
Non-Daily Portuguese News (Repeated)
Drama
Drama
TDM News
Portuguese Talk-Show/Comedy
Contest
Main News, Financial & Weather Report (Repeated)
RTPi Live
From up on that hill, perhaps wearing a capelet over a flowy
Victorian gown, Kate Bush has been regarded as a spirit saint
of fearless individuality by a generation of musicians such as
Björk and Tori Amos as well as younger mystics-in-training
such as Florence Welch, Leslie Feist and Bat for Lashes. All
that adoration in the ether must’ve stirred the reclusive British singer-songwriter to create not just one album this year
— “Director’s Cut,” a reinterpretation of songs from “The
Sensual World” and “The Red Shoes” — but also a second
one, “50 Words for Snow,” an art-song cycle that veers from
delicate to blustery but always with a sheen of elegance.
Bush grounds her songs in the permafrost of winter, with her
piano work sounding like the first stirrings after a cold snap.
“Among Angels” could be the soundtrack for plants stretching toward the new spring sun, but as much as it’s connected
to the natural world, the song twinkles with something more
ethereal. “I can see angels standing around you,” Bush sings
in her windblown soprano, “they shimmer like mirrors in
summer.”
With all seven of the songs clocking in at six to 10 minutes
each, Bush takes her time, but the songs aren’t built of different parts; it’s more like mounting meditations on one theme.
The opening track, “Snowflake,” is written from the point of
view of falling snow, the kind of precious conceit only Bush
and maybe a class of kindergarten children could get away
with. But it’s a committed trance, a chase down a liminal hallway made of ice, dust and other fleeting natural phenomena.
In the center of the song, Steve Gadd’s drums kick up and
recharge the mission, one of many examples of his key influence on the album.
Darkwave
She Wants
Revenge - Valleyheart
Sunday Mass
Miscellaneous
Cooking
TDM News (Repeated)
News at 24H (RTPi) Delayed
Broadcast
Zig Zag
Miscellaneous
Contest
Soap Opera
What the Pope Knew?
Modern Music
Portuguese Musica
Criminal Minds Sr.5
TDM News
Pankistan’s Flood Doctor
TDM Talk-Show (Repeated)
Main News, Financial & Weather Report (Repeted)
RTPi Live
- All the Way from Michigan, Not Mars (Factory 25, 2009)
Rosie Thomas has been a consistently pleasant stalwart in the indie-folk world for
over a decade, signing with Sub Pop in 2000 after providing vocals on a Damian
Jurado track.
In 2006, after years of touring, recording, and founding her own label, Sing-ALong Records, Thomas had an opportunity to make a record with two of her
very best friends, Denison Witmer and Sufjan Stevens. The album, These Friends
of Mine, features the very best of all three artists and was the impetus for Matt
Boyd’s documentary following the group of friends as they toured to support the
record.
All The Way From Michigan Not Mars is fundamentally a classic tour doc, interweaving concert and public radio interview footage with spare moments in
which Rosie recounts pivotal events that informed her unique artistic temperament. Growing up in Livonia, Michigan (a suburb of Detroit), Thomas’ musical
family instilled in her a savage curiosity that has propelled her toward a variety of
different forms of musical expression, most within the boundaries of an acoustic
aesthetic.
Using intimate live performances with fellow songwriters Sufjan Stevens and
Denison Witmer as a pathway, All the Way from Michigan Not Mars is a meditative exploration of Rosie Thomas’ work as it connects to her as a human being.
Often raising more questions than answers, the film is a lyrical examination of
Thomas’ quest for an expression of truth and her unique brand of performance;
combining songs of plaintive melancholy with sharpwitted banter and Sheila, her
bizarre stand-up comedian alter ego.
Featuring: Rosie Thomas, Sufjan Stevens, Denison Witmer and Sheila Saputo
Alternative Rock
Bombay Bicycle Club - I Had the Blues
But I Shook Them Loose (Mmm... Records, 2009)
2009 debut album from the British Alt-Pop band, a beautifully literate and ambitious release. Throw in the fact that producer Jim Abbiss was responsible for
arguably the most significant British debut of the 21st century (Arctic Monkeys’
‘Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not’) and it would be reasonable to
speculate that BBC are facing a seemingly insurmountable challenge with regard
to proving their mettle.
But if ‘I Had The Blues But I Shook Them Loose’ is the band’s Everest, not only
do they conquer it with unassuming boyish romance, but they’ve also created the
most poignant anthology of what it means to be young and restless in the city
since fellow Londoners Bloc Party’s ‘Silent Alarm’.
Indie Rock rarely gets to enjoy its innocence these days, but Bombay Bicycle Club
knows that’s exactly what makes it precious. Jamie and Jack formed Bombay Bicycle Club after spending their early teens trying to sneak into 18+ gigs together.
They were dissuaded at first by Jamie’s guitar-playing Dad, Neill MacColl (son of
Ewan, sister of Kirsty), who once told Jack he should become a plumber rather
than a musician if he ever wanted to make a decent living. Then Neill heard the
astonishing cache of songs Jack had amassed in his bedroom with Garageband
and a cheap guitar, and instantly changed his mind, offering to produce Bombay
Bicycle Club’s first demos.
Oh! And The band is playing at the Clockenflap Festival, December 10th , 11th in the
West Kowloon Waterfront Promenade located along Victoria Harbour facing Central.
Fans of Bloc Party, Broken Social Scene and Bon Iver will be utterly thrilled.
(Five Seven Music, 2011)
Sunday
11:00
12:00
12:30
13:00
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17:45
19:30
20:00
20:30
21:00
22:15
23:00
23:30
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01:00
01:30
Rosie Thomas with Denison
Witmer and Sufjan Stevens
Folk
Finally, after four years, She Wants Revenge returns with a full
length album. The concept album about the San Fernando
Valley is dark and broody. Pretty much it’s what you’d expect
from She Wants Revenge. The difference between this record
and the previous two albums though is that they branch out
in a dozen different directions from that initial Cure-esque
sound and even though that broodiness abounds in most of
these songs, not one song on this album sounds like another.
“Must Be the One” draws some heavy Edge/U2 influences.
“Holiday Song” brings to mind several new wave music influences of the eighties, and “Not Just a Girl” brings to mind
some of The Cure’s more modern works.
Justin Warfield and DJ Adam Bravin have worked with producer / rapper, Timberland and toured with Depeche Mode
and Placebo amongst others.
The group’s self titled debut album was released in early 2006,
followed by three singles, (“These Things” – whose video featured Shirley Manson from Garbage, “Out of Control”, and
the Joaquin Phoenix directed “Tear You Apart”). Their second album “This Is Forever” was released in 2007.
12
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2011
Friday
39 steps
by Tomé Quadros
A BETTER TOMORROW
CINETEATRO Room 1
Starry Starry Night
2:15/4:15/6:00/9:45pm
R
ites of passage, memories of loss and many
other moody moments
fill up the debut film
of writer-director Milagros Mumenthaler, titled “Abrir puertas y
ventanas” (“Back To Stay”) and
released this year. Mumenthaler,
whose choice of subject-matter
and technique unavoidably recalls
the early works of her acclaimed
compatriot Lucrecia Martel (“The
Swamp”, “The Holy Girl”). World
premiering in competition at Locarno, it grasped the festival’s top
award, the Golden Leopard, as
well as the international critics’
award and Best Actress (for María
Canale). This film evokes the story
of the lives of three sisters: Marina
(Maria Canale), Sofia (Martina Jucandella) and Violeta (Ailin Salas).
They live together in the house
they inherited from their recently
deceased grandmother, apparently
a highly respected teacher and an
authoritative figure at home. They
are trying to adapt to life without adult authority. Practically the entire film takes place in that
house, and very little outside the confines of
the house.
Hugo Münsterberg once said that “the cinema’s most significant property is its capacity
to manipulate reality.” “Back To Stay” holds
the emphasis firmly on character development
and atmosphere. The three girls, all of them
apparently in their early twenties (age is one
Cinema
Starring: Josie Xu, René Liu, Harlem Yu
Director: Tom Lin Shu-Yu
Language: Chinese
(English and Chinese subtitles)
Duration: 99 min
CINETEATRO Room 1
You are the Apple of My Eye
7:45pm
Starring: Michelle Chen, Chen-Tung Ko
Director: Giddens
Language: Chinese
Duration: 101 min
CINETEATRO Room 2
The Adventures of TinTin
2:30/4:30/7:30/9:30pm
Starring: Jamie Bell, Andy Serkis, Daniel Craig
Director: Steven Spielberg
Language: Chinese
Duration: 107 min
of the many things never mentioned as the
film unfolds) , have different temperaments,
reflected not only in their conduct but also in
their aspect. Marina is dowdier and homely,
Sofia is flighty and spoiled, Violeta is indolent
and bored. Details of the past are never revealed. They seem to have no outside relations
to speak of, and when Violeta suddenly runs
off with a man whose identity remains unclear
until the end, it comes as an entire surprise not
only for the audience but for her sisters as well.
Munethaler’s script deploys all its efforts on the
emotional level but refuses to unveil many of
its basic narrative details, as if wary of committing herself one way or another. Better leave the
final decisions to the eye of the beholder. “Back
To Stay” hints along the narrative something
else, which in itself seems not to exist, except in
its effects as they affect the audience.
This existential hiatus between one stage of
life and another and to accept the frictions and
bickering between the three sisters is part of
their attempts to establish their own distinct
identity, independent of the others. The cinema’s most significant feature is its capacity
to reveal truths about reality invisible to naked
human eye. The one whose doors and opens
are thrown wide open, as promised by the title,
before the end of the picture. That’s why the
Spanish title, which translates as “Open Doors
and Windows,” hints at the old phrase “Whenever a door closes, a window opens.” Whether
this kind of secrecy is part of the Argentine
family ethos, whether it has something to do
with the country’s political past Mumenthaler
suggests – that might be one of the reasons for
the absence of the girls’ parents – it is up to the
viewers to decide. How the narrative of “Back
To Stay”circumscribes space, and the way individuals function within their own spaces, ultimately becomes more interesting here than
any narrative development. This film is about
illusion of time, being alive, and human existence.
Jolie feels lucky she didn’t die young
Oscar-winning Hollywood mega-star Angelina Jolie says she’s lucky
to have survived her younger days when she dabbled in “dangerous”
things, but says there’s a part of her that is still a “bad girl.”
“I went through heavier, darker times and I survived them. I didn’t die
young,” the 36-year-old actress told CBS in an interview to be broadcast on Sunday.
“So I am very lucky. There are other artists and people that didn’t survive certain things... people can imagine that I did the most dangerous,
and I did the worst, for many reasons, I shouldn’t be here,” she added.
Jolie, who is now the partner of fellow actor Brad Pitt, was once known
for wearing a vial of her then-husband Billy Bob Thornton’s blood
around her neck. And she has been estranged from her father, the actor Jon Voight, who once said publicly that he thought his daughter
needed help.
Jolie, who is now a mother of six children, said there were “too many
times where you came close to too many dangerous things, too many
chances taken too, too far.”
But speaking during an interview in Budapest where she filmed some
of the scenes for her directorial debut “In the Land of Blood and Honey,” Jolie said that despite building a family with Pitt, she had still kept
her edge.
“I’m still a bad girl,” she said. “I still have that side of me... it’s just in its
place now... it belongs to Brad. Or... our adventures.”
The couple have three adopted children from Vietnam, Cambodia and
Ethiopia as well as a daughter and young twins.
Jolie is also a UNHCR goodwill ambassador and is known for her humanitarian work visiting refugee camps in the world’s crisis zones.
13
CINETEATRO Room 3
Seediq Bale
2:15/4:45/9:45pm
Starring: Quing-Tai, Da-Quin You
Director: Te-Sheng Wei
Language: Japonese (Chinese subtitles)
Duration: 276 min
CINETEATRO Room 3
Sleepwalker
7:15pm
Starring: Jam Hsiao, Chrissie Chow
Director: Fengbo Lee, Jimmy Wan
Language: Chinese
Macau Tower
17-Nov to 30-Nov
Immortals
4:30/9:30pm
Starring: Huge Jackman
Director: Shawn Levy
Language: English (Chinese subtitles)
Duration: 127 min
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2011
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Friday
Mouse Click
Blog of the Week
all about presentations
by António Espadinha Soares
Musicpedia hhttp://www.musipedia.org/
This is yet another “wiki”
style page. Musicpedia
aims to build a “searchable,
editable and expandable
collection of tunes, melodies, and musical themes”
which can be edited by
anybody. It makes use of
the Melody Hound melody
search engine to help you
find a tune, even if all you
know is its melody. You
can play it out on a Flashbased piano or whistle
it to a computer using a
microphone, although my
test with the later wasn’t all
that successful.
http://www.allaboutpresentations.com/
Presenting an idea is usually more complicated than
most people think, and if you don’t find a smart and
engaging way to transmit your world changing idea to
an audience, that idea is worthless. One of the very
best examples of a good presentation is any keynote
speech by late Apple CEO, Steve Jobs, and one of the
very worst is almost any of your colleagues in University who thought it to be a good idea to pack their slides
with text that they then read out during their class presentations. On this blog you’ll find great tips and strategies to build your presentations so that they’re clear
and effective.
The Evolution of the Web http://evolutionofweb.appspot.com/
I know I sometimes sound like a
broken record (that’s an old type of
mp3 for you young people), but I
can’t help but feel amazed at how
much the Internet has evolved these
past two decades. It amazes me even
more that most people just take
all of this for granted, and rarely
reflect on how we got to where we
are today. This simple and colourful
site hosts an interactive timeline of
the World Wide Web and how the
technologies and browsers that we
used today came into being. It’s not
a thorough and comprehensive look
at history, but fun to click through
and reminisce of times past.
Video of the Week
The Thorium Dream
http://www.motherboard.tv/2011/11/9/motherboard-tvthe-thorium-dream
App of the Week
Avant Browser
http://www.avantbrowser.com/
This year the world was once again made aware of the tremendous
danger that nuclear power can pose when the Fukushima Nuclear
power plant in Japan got hit by the Tsunami caused by the March earthquake that hit that country, and all of the plant’s failsafe systems proved
inadequate to prevent the ensuing nuclear catastrophe that followed,
reigniting public fear of nuclear power throughout the globe. This short
documentary is about a Thorium, a common element that can be used
as a nuclear fuel, but that would require a different type of reactor that
is inherently safer than the current Uranium powered reactors, and
which even though its viability was proven decades ago, a combination
of money and politics led to the abandonment of its development by the
US government, and is now being pursued by India and China.
Here’s an old gem I’d completely forgotten
about. Back in the days of the browser wars
there were many small contenders vying for
the attention garnered by the big boys such as
Netscape Navigator and Internet Explorer. There
was one browser that I used for quite some time
15
that used the IE rendering engine but that was
a lot more useful and less prone to exploits,
the Avant Internet browser. Its recent iteration
comes packed with features that usually have
to be added through add-ons to more popular
browsers, and it’s less than a 4 MB download.
Good
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WORLD OF BACCHUS
by Annabel Jackson
A top 10 wine list
Tiny Reims champagne house
Arlaux works with just seven
hectares of premier cru vineyards near Vrigny, producing
about 5,000 cases per year, and
is run by Christine Marechal. The
Marechal family has lived in Vrigny since the 13th century, and
went on to purchase the property in the late 18th century. Paul
Lo loves this champagne for its
warm apple tart, lemon curd and
buttered scones on the nose – a
veritable baker’s shop and all the
things that a classic champagne
should smell of. Crisp on the palate, it has citrusy fruit and toastiness; and a long finish.
Ermitage Le Pavillon,
M. Chapoutier 2003
Area: Hermitage, Northern
Rhone, France
Grape: 100% Syrah
Colour/style: Dry red
Alcohol: 15.8%
Available at: Hotel Lisboa/
Grand Lisboa
Tel: 2888 3888
Price: MOP5,600
Arlaux Brut NV
Area: Champagne, France
Grape: 75% Chardonnay, 15% Pinot
Noir, 10% Pinot Meunier
Colour/style: Dry sparkling
Alcohol: 12%
Available at:
Hotel Lisboa/Grand Lisboa
Tel: 2888 3888
Price: MOP800
Just 659 cases of the excellent
2003 vintage were made. For Paul
Lo, the wine is incredibly rich as well
as awesomely well-delineated and
fresh. It positively cascades over the
palate (an unforgettable characteristic of top Northern Rhone Syrahs)
and richness and intensity but silkiness too. It will last for a half century
or longer – and Lo says it will be fascinating to follow it over the next few
decades. Robert Parker has given it
100 points, and Lo comments how
he finds this wine more drinkable
than the other 100 pointers within
this price range on the hotel’s wine
list.
Monday to Thursday
6:30am - 3:00pm/6:00pm-10:00pm
Friday to Sunday
6:30am-10:00pm
R
Friday
2525
November
2011
Friday
November
2011
ight here, on our doorstep, we are
privileged to have access to one of
the top 10 wines lists in the entire
world. Every year since 2005, the
wine list of Hotel Lisboa/Grand Lisboa has
featured on the Grand Award page of the
influential American wine magazine, Wine
Spectator. Award criteria are stringent, based
not only on the number of wine labels and
bottles sourced, but also on the existence
of a respectable wine programme, and on
the provision of tip-top wine service. The list
here, overseen by the hugely knowledgeable
Executive Director Alan Ho, and passionate Food & Beverage Director, Paul Lo, now
has more than 8,200 labels, and there are a
remarkable16 wine cellars across the properties. The largest cellar, located at basement
level, accommodates over 80,000 bottles!
The inventory is, hardly surprisingly, managed
by a very sophisticated computer system,
which is what allows bottles to be located
and then on-hand within minutes. The most
prestigious restaurants, such as Robuchon a
Galera, Don Afonso 1890 and The Kitchen,
have supporting wine cellars nearby so that
wines can be guaranteed to be served within
the 5-10 minutes which the magazine’s jury
members – as well the consumer – would
expect. The list, which is expected to reach
10,000 labels in just a matter of time, is now
available on iPad (the actual list is a veritable
bible in weight and size, with a thick leather
cover), but apparently guests usually rely on
recommendations from the property’s team
of sommeliers. Those who do opt to stroll
through the list tend to buy French – perhaps
because the French sections are at the front!
– and there are quite a few hidden treasures
there, such as some of the second growths of
Bordeaux, from the less acclaimed vintages.
By way of advice, here Paul Lo picks two of
his favourites from the list, at different price
point.
Annabel Jackson is a wine and food writer, consultant and
educator. She is a part-time lecturer at IFT.
Lion’s Bar
Tuesday to Sunday
7pm - 5am
(Closed every Monday)
Tel: 8802 2375 / 8802 2376
Monday to Thursday: 6:30 pm - 12:00 midnight
Friday to Saturday: 6:00 pm - 02:00 am
Sunday: 6:00 pm - 12:00 midnight
16
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Friday25
25November
November2011
2011
Friday
ORchitectures
C
onsidered one of the greatest
architectural challenges, the design
of a museum can invoke its surroundings, be subject to an existing building or provide opportunity for the
creation of alternative and amazing spaces,
worthy of more attention from the public
than the content presented. Can the architectural concept override the functionality of
the museum? What is the role of museums
today? How we look at them? How we use
them?
Designed by Álvaro Siza, with Carlos
Castanheira and Jun Sung Kim, the Mimesis Museum, built in Paju city, northwest of
Seoul, was born of a gesture. According to
Carlos Castanheira: “Architect Siza designed
it at once, almost without lifting the pencil
from the paper. Then I remembered a story
I was told long ago… There once was a Chinese emperor who liked cats a lot, and one
day he called upon the most famous painter
in the Empire and asked him to paint him
a cat. The artist liked the idea and promised
that he would work on it. A year passed and
the Emperor remembered that the painter
still had not given him the painting of the cat.
He called him: ‘What of the cat?’ ‘It is nearly
ready’, answered the artist. Another year went
by, and another and another. The scene kept
repeating itself. After seven years, the Emperor’s patience came to an end and he sent
for the painter. ‘What of the cat? Seven years
have gone by. You have promised and promised but I still haven’t seen one!’ The painter
grabs a sheet of rice paper, an ink well, one
of those brushes you can only get in the East
and… in an elegant and sublime gesture he
draws a cat, which was not just a cat but the
most beautiful cat ever seen. The Emperor
was ecstatic, overwhelmed with such beauty.
He did not neglect (which is no longer the
case nowadays) to ask the artist how much
he would charge for such beautiful drawing.
The painter asked for a sum which surprised
the Emperor. ‘So much money for a drawing that you did in two seconds, in front of
me?’ said the Emperor. ‘Yes Excellency, that
is true, but I have been drawing cats for seven
years now, replied the poor painter.”
The built volume, defined by curved surfaces
of white concrete, develops around a courtyard, open at one end. “The building assumes
contained facades when oriented to the adjacent buildings and free shapes when facing the
main avenue and the Hangang River, which
borders North Korea. In a symbolic interpretation, the curved surfaces that mark the main
entrance seem to welcome with open arms
the visitors from both Koreas.”
The Mimesis Museum includes spans of
glass, more or less extensive on the ground
floor, which houses the reception, the areas
of temporary exhibitions and a coffee shop,
and reveals a hermetic character in the mezzanine, lodging administrative spaces and the
museum shop, and top floor, which showcases the permanent collection.
by Tiago Quadros
* Visiting Professor at the University of Saint Joseph
Mimesis
The natural and artificial lighting of the
exhibition areas is, in most surfaces, top
and indirect. In the basement the archives
and technical areas are located, looked at
“perhaps as an extension of the exhibition
space, which has become customary in the
museums of Álvaro Siza.” The interiors are
dominated by white walls and ceilings, and
the honey-colored wood oak that covers the
floors, apart from the entry floor coated with
white marble from Estremoz.
According to Carlos Castanheira: “The Mimesis is a cat. A cat, all curled up and also
open, that stretches and yawns. It’s all there.
17
All you need to do is look and look again.
At first the design team members could not
understand how that sketch of a cat could
be a building. I have in my days seen many
sketches of cats, and am always overwhelmed
by them, can’t get tired of them. I want to see
more cats, more sketches of cats, for several
seven years have gone by.”
Mimesis is intended for a private collection
of Contemporary Art. It installs the suspicion
that the phenomenon of art museums as
buildings is reduced to an - amazing - architectural shell that, according to a recent fashion. is treated as art, as sculpture. Do we have
returned to psychophysics, that Ozenfant and
Jeanneret used as a starting point, under the
title Sur la Plastique, in which the architectural structures act on the human soul with a
mechanical precision? And where is art?
Clearly the museum building as a “cathedral
of our time” and the museum as an institution dedicated to art are two different things.
Also in this case work the mechanisms of
supply and demand. And what has caused
this boom of museums? At least it is questionable whether the proliferation of museums is truly – or exclusively -justified by the
flow of visitors and the interest in art.
“Siza’s architecture does not have the selfreferential character of Minimalism, it is close
to the problems, full of existential nerve. It is
also the result of the historicist pressure from
the eighties, a multipolar architecture though
never explicitly eclectic or resulting from any
collage.” In South Korea, “outside but centrally”, as regards Jorge Figueira, Álvaro Siza
remains faithful to ideological assumptions
that determine the historical process of modern architecture. Siza allows himself to integrate the “doubts” in the project, giving the
modern grammar shades and nuances that
extend the contextual and identity scope.
About Siza, Távora once said that “he drew
like an angel.”
About Mimesis we would say that Siza elevates and suspends, making the world gravitate into his architecture.
Friday
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Friday
November
2011
by Jean Alberti
Photography by Jo Jo Mamangun
Jean Alberti, Macau.
com’s food and
beverage columnist
and Chef at Large.
Brasserie aw
Warmly lit and simply but elegantly decorated, Aux
Beaux Arts is comfortable and welcoming like a
brasserie should be. But this is a brasserie with
an interesting twist. Head Chef Elie Khalife is from
Lebanon, and he likes to incorporate traditional
Middle Eastern spices into his French dishes.
Truffle caviar are created using a 21st century cooking technique
known as spherification. As black truffle juice is dripped into a bath
of cold sodium alginate, chemical reactions cause a thin membrane
to congeal around a liquid sphere. Pioneered by the famous Catalan
chef Ferran Adrià, spherification typifies the inventive, scientifically
savvy, modern cooking methods that have come to be called molecular gastronomy.
I
f you’re from France and you
leave home, one of things you’re
bound to miss are the neighborhood cafés and restaurants
known as brasseries. The word
means beer hall, but that literal
translation doesn’t do justice to the
simple but elegant charm, good
food and friendly atmosphere for
which brasseries are famous.
For a brasserie fix in Macau, there
is only one option, but luckily it’s a
great one: Aux Beaux Arts at the
MGM Macau. Warmly lit and simply
but elegantly decorated, it’s comfortable and welcoming like a brasserie
should be. But this is a brasserie
with an interesting twist. The head
chef at Beaux Arts, Elie Khalife, is
from Lebanon, and he likes to incorporate traditional Middle Eastern
spices into his French dishes.
Elie has invited us to Aux Beaux
Arts to try some of his favorite dishes. First stop, the spice rack, which,
in addition to the usual suspects, is
stocked with cardamom, turmeric
and aniseed. “Sumac!” says Elie,
showing off a bowl of bright red
powder. “It’s a great way to add
color and flavor to a dish.” He holds
out a teaspoon so that I can try a
taste of the sour spice. “Interesting,
isn’t it? I like to make things a little
more intense here.”
Elie seats us at a rustic wooden
table in the wine cellar, where mirrored panels reflect the thousands
of bottles on the racks, giving the
impression of a never-ending supply.
Elie’s first dish is steak tartare, a
brasserie standard. Not everyone
appreciates the charms of raw meat,
but steak tartare is a dish I love,
and Elie’s version is great. He’s
mixed diced Omaha beef with cocktail sauce, capers, gherkin, finely
chopped onion, parsley, a dash of
Tabasco, and, he says with a wink,
at least one secret ingredient. He
serves the tartare with fries and a
green salad, exactly as they do in
France.
Next, Elie serves an egg, slowcooked for 25 minutes at 68 degrees
until the yolk has turned thick and
creamy. The egg rests on a bed of
custardy mushroom royale and is
coated with foamed chicken jus. It’s
an expertly executed dish, but it’s the
garnish that steals the show. Onto
the single thin crostini that accompanies the dish, Elie has carefully
spooned a ridge of miniature black
pearls—caviar.
Elie is observing us intently as we
eat, watching for our reaction to
what happens next. The glistening
little spheres do burst wonderfully
between the teeth, just like caviar,
but the juice that floods out has the
unmistakable taste not of caviar but
of black truffles.
“Looks like caviar,” says Elie. “Tastes
like truffles!”
He explains that the truffle caviar
were created by spherification, or, to
be more precise, reverse spherifica-
tion. Pioneered by the famous Catalan chef Ferran Adrià, this 21st century culinary technique allows almost
any fluid to be encapsulated within a
delicate, spherical membrane. It’s a
surprising, playful effect, and we’re
all delighted.
When Elie appears with the next
dish, something seems to be
missing. On one side of the plate
is a fresh pea and squid risotto,
crowned by two enormous bright
red prawns. On the other side:
empty white space. Wetting a brush
in a jar of squid ink, Elie paints a
confident black stroke across the
plate and with this flourish of edible
calligraphy corrects the imbalance.
“Presentation is very important,”
he says. “Guests eat first with their
eyes.”
The preserved lemons served with
the risotto are a common ingredient in Middle Eastern cuisine and
they add a nice citrus zing to the
dish. The prawns come from a small
Spanish island in the Mediterranean
Sea. We’re curious: which island?
Elie only smiles, a bit sheepishly—
he knows that’s secret number two.
RECIPE
Steak Tartare
Steak tartare is named for the Tartars, the Turkic nomads who in the
rampaging Mongol horde. Constantly on the move, short on time to
strips of freshly killed meat under their saddles. Marinated in salty h
constant pounding, the meat was soon ready to eat.
Beef
200 grams beef tenderloin
3 gherkins, finely chopped
5 grams capers, finely chopped
1 salted anchovy, rinsed and finely chopped
2 shallots, finely chopped
3 grams finely chopped parsley
Cocktail Sauce
Wine Pairing
With Chef Elie’s red Spanish gambas and pea risotto, try a glass of Le
Serre Nuove dell’ Ornellaia, 2007,
from Italy. This opulent, dark red wine
features notes of black cherry, chocolate and cinnamon spice. The velvety
texture and full-bodied, harmoniously
mingling flavors serve as an excellent complement to the gambas.
18
2 organic egg yolks at room temperature
1 lemon’s fresh-squeezed juice
100 ml extra virgin olive oil
1 tbs ketchup
10 grams Dijon mustard
Splash of Cognac or Armagnac
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
Preparation
Slice the tenderloin into thin sheets. Cut across the sheets to create
create tiny cubes—the smaller the better.
Place the egg yolk in a bowl with the mustard, salt and lemon juice.
the olive oil a little at the time until the mixture is smooth. Add the ke
Add the beef cubes to the cocktail sauce along with the gherkins, an
Stir well to combine all the ingredients. Season to taste with salt and
Mold equal quantities of the tartare into two chef’s rings. Remove th
French fries.
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Chef Elie adds the final touches to his
steak tartare.
Spanish gambas are famously big and delicious. Fishermen haul these
beautiful red prawns in from the Mediterranean Sea and sell them daily
at markets all along Spain’s coast. Connoisseurs believe that the flavor
of the gambas depends on the specific location of the catch.
Is the island really a part of Spain?
His smile widens.
The highlight of our tasting might
be Elie’s pan-seared foie gras. The
surprise comes again from the accompaniment, a coral-red rhubarb
chutney. Subtly infused with Middle
Eastern spices, the tart chutney
plays perfect counterpoint to the buttery mellowness of the foie gras. If
there’s a secret involved in making it
so delicious, I don’t need to know it.
It isn’t a time for more questions. The
only thing to do is to keep eating.
by Jean Alberti
e 13th century joined Genghis Khan’s
cook, the Tartar horsemen rode with
horse sweat and tenderized by the
Tart, sweet poached
rhubarb makes a refreshing
accompaniment to the rich,
fatty foie gras.
Black Truffles
e strips of meat. Cut across the strips to
Whisk well to combine, then whisk in
etchup, Cognac and black pepper.
nchovies, shallots, capers and parsley.
d black pepper.
he rings and serve the tartare with
Bon appétit!
To see more photos and a video interview with Chef Elie, go to www.macau.com/en/dining
19
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November
2011
What’s on
Originated in Monaco, Top Marques will exhibit in
Macau the latest exclusive sports cars and other luxuries
like jewellery and watches. This first ever exhibition
in Macau will highlight the latest trends in the world of
luxury. During the event, a 2.1 km of tarmac next to the
exhibition venue will be allocated for test drives, where
invited guests will have the opportunity to get behind the
wheel of the greatest cars in the world.
TODAY(NOV 25)
Fringe: ‘Bus is Crazy in Love’ – Clown Drama
Time: 10am-6pm
Date: November 24-27,2011
Venue: Cotai Expo, Venetian Macau-Resort-Hotel
Admission: MOP380
Telephone Enquiries: (852) 2521 1498
Organiser: Bayshore Pacific Exhibitions
http://www.topmarquesmacau.com
Fringe: 10 Years Old
– Drama by Shine House
Three strangers meet in a
bus. Macau’s heritage scene
brings back their old sweet
but cruel memories. They
become crazy and force
audience to go back along
with them to their memory.
This mime comedy will be
performed in a bus.
Time: 8pm-9pm
Venue: Tap Seac Square
Admission: MOP50
Telephone Enquiries: (853)
8988 4130/ 8988 4131
Organiser: The Civic and
Municipal Affairs Bureau
http://www.icm.gov.mo/om
TOMORROW (NOV 26)
Expressive Virtuosity
Forget that old-fashioned poster image of the children
playing with balloons. Here’s the ‘balloonatic’ show for
adults only: Naughty, ironic, hilarious. Prepare yourself
for random bursts of laughs.
The workshop of Balloon Art will be held on November
26 at 5pm-5:45pm at the Tap Seac Square, free
admission.
SUNDAY (NOV 27)
Onegin – National Ballet of China
Time: 10:30pm-11:15pm
Venue: Portal Bar
Admission: MOP50
Language: English
Telephone Enquiries: (853) 8988 4130/ 8988 4131
Organiser: The Civic and Municipal Affairs Bureau
It is a story about future. When the natural resources
of the world becomes less and less. A country establish
a 10-year-old regulation, every citizen must finish his
rebirth to death within 10 years!
Date & Time: 8pm-9pm (November 26)
3pm-4pm (November 27)
Venue: Teng May Be Art Center
Admission: MOP50
Language: Mandarin, Cantonese
MONDAY (NOV 28)
Fringe: Drawing in Process
– Painting and Installation by Pak Keong
Fringe: Garden Jasmine – Puppet show
Experience the unsurpassed mastery and sublime art of
flautist Emmanuel Pahud! Internationally acclaimed and
universally lauded, Pahud will create musical meaning
right in front of your eyes. Witness the creation of ‘a
golden stream of sound from his 14-carat golden flute’ in
his rendition of the lavish and folk-infused Flute Concerto
by Aram Khachaturian.
Time: 8pm
Venue: St. Dominic’s Church
Admission: Free (Tickets will be distributed at the
venue one hour before the concert starts, only two
tickets per person)
Organiser: Macau Orchestra
Onegin is a ballet adaptation of Pushkin’s classic
novel in verse, Eugene Onegin, which is acclaimed
as one of the most moving ballets of the 20th century.
Choreographed by John Cranko and using Tchaikovsky’s
music, it integrates the merits of symphonic ballet and
ballet drama and remains the best of Cranko’s works
since its advent in 1965 and the innovative choreography
is a wonderful match to the music.
Fringe: Balloonacy Cabaret
Jasmine finds her friends in the garden: walking flowers
and passionate trees. Together they conjure up a magical
spectacle in this marvellously creative puppet show.
Suitable for children aged 3 years and older.
Time: 2:30pm-3:15pm
5pm-5:45pm
Venue: Orient Foundation Macau,
at Largo de Camões
Admission: MOP50
http://www.icm.gov.mo/o
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Time: 8pm
Venue: Grand Auditorium, Macau Cultural Centre,
Avenida Xian Xing Hai, NAPE
Admission: MOP50, MOP120, MOP180
Organiser: Sociedade de Jogos de Macau, S.A.
http://www.macauticket.com
Top Marques Macau 2011
Peep the artist through a small hole … What is he doing
inside there? After a 5 days inbox painting, he will show
you his creation.
Time: 5pm-10pm
Venue: Tap Seac Square
Admission: Free
TUESDAY (NOV 29)
2011 Kumpoo Macau
Open Badminton Grand Prix Gold
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Badminton fans of all ages can rejoice – as the 2011 Kumpoo® Macau
Open Badminton Grand Prix Gold tournament brings world-class badminton
talent to Macau’s CotaiArena.
Officially sanctioned by the Badminton World Federation (BWF), the
tournament received entries from 25 countries and regions last year, with
around 400 players and officials coming to participate, many of whom
currently rank in the world’s top 20. Some of Asia’s most well-known players
participated, including Lee Chong Wei from Malaysia, Lee Hyun-il and Lee
Yong Dae from Korea, Ponsana Boonsak from Thailand and many more.
The Macau Open has been a high-standard international badminton
tournament since 2006. This year’s tournament is a BWF Level 3 event and
will award around MOP 1,600,000 in total prize money. The tournament will
consist of five brackets: Men’s and Women’s Singles, Men’s and Women’s
Doubles, and Mixed Doubles.
Qualifying & Quarter-Finals
(November 29 - December 2)
Admission: MOP50, MOP70
Semi - Finals & Finals (December 3-4)
Admission: MOP80, MOP100
Organiser: Badminton Federation of Macau (BFM)
Venue: CotaiArena,
the Venetian Macau-Resort-Hotel, Macau
Telephone Enquiries: (+853) 2823 8035
Email: [email protected]
WEDNESDAY (NOV30)
Fringe: “Exercício vago”
– Music Theatre by JacAl Map (Malaysia)
Original experimental music composed to go with poems written by a
Malaysian poet, video art, and live sound performances. This show will redefine musical theatre for you.
Time: 8pm-9pm
Venue: Teng May Be Art Center
Admission: MOP50
Language: English, Cantonese
THURSDAY (DEC 1)
Convergence of Aspirations
An Exhibition of Donated Painting
and Calligraphy by Jao Tsung-I to MAM
The exhibition showcases 21 paintings and 13 calligraphic works produced
from the 1970s to the current year, all of which are representative works of
Jao and are particularly precious. It is believed that exhibition-goers will be
able to grasp a deeper understanding of the artistic style of a scholar excelling
in both Chinese and Western cultures in addition to academic studies and the
arts through this exhibition.
Opening hours: 10am-7pm (No admission after 6:30pm, closed on
Mondays)
Venue: Macau Museum of Art,
Av. Xian Xing Hai, NAPE
Admission: MOP5 (Free admission on Sundays and public holidays)
Organiser: Macau Museum of Art
http://www.artmuseum.gov.mo
*All care is taken in compiling this form guide however Macau Daily
Times accepts no responsibility for any errors in data.
21
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A small wine
shop in the
village of SainteCroix-du-Mont,
southwestern
France
s
n
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t
m
a
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a
g
g
e
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Su
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i
w
h
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F
n
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sou
by Suzanne Mustacich
S
weet wine growers in the hills near
Bordeaux have been left sour-faced
after a village convenience store was
fined in court for selling them tonnes
of sugar – allegedly to make jam.
France allows growers to add grape must
or sugar during fermentation in order to
increase the degree of alcohol in their wine,
but with strict rules on the quantity allowed.
There is also a tax of 13 euros per 100 kilos
of sugar.
The DGCCRF fraud prevention agency
grew suspicious after granulated sugar sales
turned brisk at Le Montecrucien convenience store, the only shop in Sainte-Croixdu-Mont, population 900, located 40 minutes from Bordeaux.
On November 4 the store manager, Therese Solano, received a suspended 5,000-euro
fine on charges of selling sugar to professionals – winegrowers in particular – without
recording the purchasers’ names as required
by law.
The court found that she had sold 157
tonnes of sugar without invoices, over a twoyear period.
The store owner’s lawyer argued that she
was being made a scapegoat for suspected
abuses by local winegrowers.
Solano said that her customers were making jam, as far as she knew, and that her competitive pricing attracted a wide clientele.
But the court dismissed the explanation as
lacking credibility, pointing out spikes in sales
at around harvest time, notably in 2007.
“We have heard this before in situations
where they are selling sugar at this time of
year,” an agent from the DGCCRF wine
brigade told AFP. “But given the amount of
sugar, it could only be sales to professionals,
and in this case, winegrowers.”
The year 2007 is remembered for its dismal
weather, one of the factors which can prompt
winegrowers to add sugar to their harvest.
The DGCCRF wine brigade told AFP it suspects the store was helping local winegrowers sweeten their crop beyond the authorised
limit – rather than dodge taxes.
“In 2007 alone, what was sold over three
months corresponds to the annual consumption of a city of 10,000 inhabitants,”
said a DGCCRF agent, quoted in the Sud
Ouest newspaper earlier this month. “In the
Vineyards in the village of SainteCroix-du-Mont, southwestern
France, on November 16
23
Gironde, it’s the first time we have had an affair of such an important volume.”
The village in question is surrounded as far
the eye can see by vineyards producing sweet
white wines made from grapes affected by
noble rot.
No specific growers were named in the
case, but the local wine syndicate, located a
few steps from Le Montecrucien, expressed
indignation at the implied guilt of the 50 estates producing Sainte-Croix-du-Mont appellation wines.
“The quantity of sugar is too enormous to
only concern the winegrowers of our appellation,” said syndicate head Nicolas Solane.
Syndicate treasurer Jean-Guy Meric said he
doubted fellow growers would flaunt the authorities.
“Given the economic difficulties facing us
at the moment, I do not think winegrowers would be messing around with amusing
themselves with this sort of thing,” he said.
“There is a certain tolerance for adding
sugar, but beyond that we are tightly monitored by the government.”
The suspected sugar scam is the largest in
recent memory in the Bordeaux region, but a
similar scandal erupted in the rival Beaujolais
winemaking region in 2009, in which 600
tonnes of sugar was sold without invoices to
winemakers.
In that instance 53 Beaujolais producers
received fines ranging from 2,000 to 20,000
euros. Two middlemen and three supermarkets and their directors were also convicted
and harshly fined, dealing a blow to the image of Beaujolais.
AFP
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Ask The Vet
by Dr Ruan Du Toit Bester
My Dog has Glaucoma …
Please send
all your questions to
[email protected]
or mail to;
Dr Ruan Du Toit Bester
Rua, D.R, L, P, Marquest
2/F, Flat B, Ponte 6A,
Macau SAR.
Tel: +852 66706906
Question Categories
to be covered are:
-All about Dogs.
-All about Cats.
-All about Exotics.
-All about pet
ownership.
-All about nutrition.
We will be focusing
on the following;
Allergies
Avian/Exotics
Behavior
Boarding
Dental
Digestive System
Diseases
Ears
General
Heart
Hormones
Husbandry
Medications
Musculoskeletal
Neoplasia
Nervous System
Nutrition
Reproductive System
Respiratory
Skin
Surgery
Travel
Urinary
Vaccinations
Ask the Vet - is a
service that allows
you to ask questions about your
pets’ health and
behavior. My goal
is to help you, the
pet owner, improve
the knowledge of
your pet’s everyday
needs and health
care in Macau
through a variety
of pet services and
veterinary resources that where never available to pet
owners before.
DEAR DR RUAN
Ball Ball, our 9-year-old cocker spaniel, is blind in her left eye because of
“glaucoma”. Is there some way to prevent the same thing from happening with
her right eye? Please help as no one in
Macau seems to be able to treat it right. JEN. FROM TAIPA Hello Jen,
Yes and no... It’s confusing but this is
nature. I have discussed this before but will
quickly give you an update on the process. Glaucoma is increased intra-ocular
pressure. Pressure within the eyeball increases when fluids inside the eye cannot drain normally.
Glaucoma can affect any dog (or cat),
but it seems to strike spaniels (especially cockers), terriers, basset hounds and
beagles most commonly, usually during
middle age. Also dogs that have diabetes. Early glaucoma has no outward symptoms, but when pressure inside the eye
builds, internal eye damage starts. Eventually, as the pressure continues to increase,
the eye becomes red. Affected dogs experience a great deal of pain and eventually
become blind.
The only way to know whether intraocular pressure is increasing before vision is affected is to test the pressure.
Your veterinarian has the proper equipment (Or should have), and the test is
quick and painless. Normal pressure is
23-25. Anything above this is bad and
can cause pressure on the retina with
retinal degeneration and atrophy (The
blood supply to the retina is being cut of
by the pressure, and the retina, the main
structure of the eye that catches the light
and sends it to the brain is damaged)
Sadly, glaucoma eventually affects both
eyes in most dogs. Six to eight months after glaucoma is diagnosed in one eye, the
second eye will be affected unless preventive medication is given. With this medication, glaucoma doesn’t appear in the
second eye for about 31 months.
Therefore, most veterinarians recommend treating the unaffected eye to delay
the onset of the pain and blindness associated with glaucoma. Eye drops and oral
medications are available. Please ask your
vet for the right medication for Glaucoma
to decrease the pressure in the eye. They
should have it. If not please let me know. By the way, humans develop glaucoma
too, so talk with your eye care professional or family physician about periodic
glaucoma testing.
Hope this helps
Till next week
Dr Ruan Bee-ware: buzzing bees keep elephants at bay
No need for big muscles or high-tech contraptions
when it comes to protecting African plantations from
elephants: a British biologist has discovered that buzzing bees will keep the beasts at bay.
Lucy King, a researcher at Oxford University, was
honoured Tuesday by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) in the western Norwegian
town of Bergen for devising a wire fence connected
to apiaries that begin to buzz when an elephant trips
the wire.
The African Savannah elephant may be the biggest
land animal on the planet, weighing in at some seven
tonnes, but it is terrified of bees and makes off at the
first hum of the insect.
Pachyderms may have thick hides, but bees are at-
25
tracted to the sensitive areas around their eyes and
inside their trunks.
King’s discoveries have enabled several Kenyan villages to protect their plantations from herds of elephants, which often ruin their fields and deprive the
local populations of their livelihoods.
“Her research underlines how working with, rather than against, nature can provide humanity with
many of the solutions to the challenges countries and
communities face,” UNEP executive director Achim
Steiner said in a statement.
Bergen is this week hosting a conference organised
by the Convention of the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals, also known as the Bonn
Convention.
Good
Culture
Business
World Times
World
Friday
2525
November
2011
Friday
November
2011
26
Times world
Protesters shot dead by
Saleh loyalists in Yemen
L
oyalists of Yemeni
President Ali Abdullah
Saleh shot dead five
people in Sanaa yesterday who
had been protesting against
a power transfer deal that
promises him immunity from
prosecution, medics said.
The five were all killed by live
rounds, said the medics at a
field hospital set up protesters
in the capital’s Change Square,
where they have been camped
out since February.
Thirty-four others were
wounded, the medics added.
An AFP correspondent said
the protesters were met by
gunfire from armed men in
plain clothes whom they deride as Saleh’s “thugs”, as they
marched towards the city centre.
Activists who have spearheaded 10 months of protests
against Saleh’s rule had called
for a mass rally to protest
against the promises of im-
Yemeni anti-government protesters react after President Ali Abdullah Saleh signed a
deal transfer power in Sanaa on Wednesday
munity granted to him and
his family under the agreement with the parliamentary
opposition which the veteran
president signed in Riyadh on
Wednesday.
The protesters also chanted
slogans against the Common
Forum parliamentary opposition bloc led by the Islamist
Al-Islah (reform) party.
“Common Forum, Islah,
leave after the assailant,” they
shouted, referring to Saleh,
who is expected to go straight
from the Saudi capital to New
York for medical treatment.
After the attack, the marchers returned to Change Square
as pro- and anti-Saleh gun-
men deployed across the capital, sending tensions soaring,
residents said.
In Yemen’s second-largest
city Taez, another centre of the
protests against Saleh’s 33year rule, “hundreds of thousands” took to the streets yesterday with similar demands,
organisers said.
Nearly half a million Russians
queue to touch holy relic
Believers standing in a line to enter the Moscow Christ the Saviour
Cathedral to see an Orthodox relic, the Belt of the Virgin Mary, which
arrived in Russia from the Vatopedi Monastery, on the Mount Athos
Braving sub-zero temperatures and a line
stretching several kilometres, almost half a
million Russians have queued this week to
venerate a relic of the Virgin Mary brought
to Moscow from Greece.
The Moscow authorities said 400,000
people had queued outside Moscow’s vast
Cathedral of Christ the Saviour since ‘The
Belt of the Virgin Mary’ relic arrived on
Saturday. Around 82,000 were queuing
yesterday alone.
In an extraordinary display of the strength
of Orthodox Christianity in post-Soviet
Russia, the faithful have stood in a queue
stretching five kilometres (three miles).
The Belt of the Virgin Mary is believed to
help women’s fertility and cure illnesses.
Worshippers have endure up to 26 hours
in line in order to go inside the church to
touch it.
“I am 74, and I have suffered a heart attack. I am handicapped in my arm and
leg,” said one man, identifying himself as
Vladimir, after exiting the imposing white
cathedral and leaning on his wife’s supporting arm.
“Maybe it will help?” he said, tears welling up in his eyes.
Iraq executes 16 ‘Qaeda’ members
Iraq yesterday executed
16 Al-Qaeda members convicted of involvement in
the massacre of 70 people
at a wedding, although they
were officially put to death
for other murders, a judicial
spokesman said.
“Sixteen people were executed this morning,” Abdelsattar Birakdar told AFP,
adding that “all of them were
Al-Qaeda members.”
Birakdar said that the 16
were convicted of involvement in the massacre of 70
people at a wedding in 2006,
but were put to death for the
sectarian murders of cooking gas salesmen.
Baghdad security spokesman Major General Qassim
Atta said in May that “the
gas sellers were from Sadr
The head of the Moscow city centre prefecture Pavel Bolshunov told Russian news
agencies that as of yesterday morning over
407,000 people had visited the relic since
the weekend and another 82,000 were
currently waiting.
Faced with the incredible queues, the
Russian Orthodox Church extended the
relic’s stay in Moscow by three days to Sunday.
An intercom announcement on the Moscow metro at the stop nearest to the Cathedral warned people arriving by the subway
that the line stretched along the Moscow
river for nearly five kilometres and its end
was in a distant neighbourhood four metro
stops away.
Struggling to contain the throngs of Orthodox believers, the city erected a maze of
metal holding barriers, rerouted traffic on
some of the streets, and brought in 1,500
police officers to ensure order.
A woman pleaded with one officer yesterday to be allowed to the top of the queue.
“But I took the day off already!” she said,
wringing her hands. Parents ushered
boys and girls through the barricades in a
separate queue for children and the handicapped.
The Belt of the Virgin Mary is kept permanently in Vatopedi monastery on the
Greek mount Athos and this is its first ever
appearance in Russia.
City in Baghdad. They used
to come to the Taji area to
sell gas to residents.”
The Sadr City district in the
north of the capital is overwhelmingly Shiite. Taji on
the city outskirts is mainly
Sunni Arab.
The gas sellers were killed
in 2006 and their bodies set
on fire, Atta said without
specifying how many.
27
According to police, militants also carried out the
systematic killing of a wedding party celebrating the
marriage of a Shiite man to
a Sunni woman in the Taji
area in 2006.
The murders came as confessional violence was raging across Iraq, with tens of
thousands killed in 2006 and
2007.
®
Syria: two killed
ahead of Arab
League meet
At least two more civilians were killed in
Syria yesterday, activists said, as the Arab
League prepared to meet to discuss measures against Damascus over its bloody
crackdown on dissent.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights
said a sniper killed a man in the Bayyada area
of the flashpoint central city of Homs, where
security forces shot dead another civilian during a raid in Karm el-Zeitoun district.
It said heavy machinegun fire blasted the
city of Rastan following a one-hour clash
early yesterday between soldiers and army
defectors.
On Tuesday, six children and five mutinous soldiers were among 34 people killed
across Syria, according to the Britainbased group.
Ahead of the Arab League meeting in the
Egyptian capital, Lebanon’s Foreign Minister
Adnan Mansur said Beirut would not endorse
any potential sanctions against Syria.
“Lebanon will not endorse any sanctions by
the Arab League against Syria,” Mansur, who
is backed by the Shiite militant group Hezbollah, which is supported by Damascus and
Tehran, said before heading to Cairo.
Lebanon voted against when Damascus was
suspended from the 22-member Arab League
earlier this month, siding with Yemen and
Syria, as pressure mounts on the regime of
President Bashar al-Assad to end its bloody
crackdown on dissent.
The United Nations says the conflict in Syria
has claimed more than 3,500 lives, mostly civilians, since it broke out in mid-March.
Hamas-Fatah talks
begin in Cairo
Top-level talks between Palestinian leader
Mahmud Abbas and Hamas chief Khaled Meshaal got under way at a Cairo hotel yesterday in a bid to resolve issues blocking implementation of a unity deal.
The two leaders were seen entering a room
to begin talks, an AFP correspondent said,
in their first meeting since May, when they
signed a surprise reconciliation deal aimed at
ending years of bitter rivalry.
Izzat al-Rishq, a Hamas leader from Damascus, said the talks “will start with a face-toface meeting between Abbas and Meshaal
which will last about two hours.”
The meeting would then be opened up to delegations from the two factions, he told AFP
late on Wednesday.
On the agenda are key issues including the
adoption of a unified Palestinian strategy,
forming an interim government, reform of the
Palestine Liberation Organisation and agreeing on a date for elections.
Hamas and Fatah, which respectively control
the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, have long
been political rivals.
Under terms of the May agreement they were
to have worked on setting up interim government of technocrats to pave the way for presidential and parliamentary elections within a
year.
But there has been no progress over the last
six months, with the parties bickering over the
composition of the temporary government and
who would take on the role of premier.
Times
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Certified
Public Accountant
( Registered Auditor since 1983 )
Expat from Australia. Over 200-years Family history in Macau
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Luiz F. Da Silva Pedruco
Bach. Fin. Admin. U.N.E (Aust.)Fellow of H.K.I.C.P.A., CPA (Aust.)
[email protected]
Address: No. 665 Av. da Praia Grande
Edif. Great Will, 14th “B” Macau
Tel: 28 355 388
Website: www.cpamacao.com
28
Times world
Portugal general strike over
budget cuts disrupts transport
F
lights and public
transport were disrupted in Portugal
yesterday as workers staged
nationwide strikes in protest
at a tough 2012 austerity
budget aimed at helping the
country pay its debt.
The Lisbon metro was at a
standstill and ferries across
the capital’s Tagus River
were functioning only intermittently. Train services
were also disrupted.
The national TAP airline
cancelled 86 percent of its
scheduled flights, a company
official said, adding that air
traffic controllers were planning to ensure only the bare
minimum coverage.
“The first indications are of
very strong support” for the
strike, said Manuel Carvalho
da Silva, secretary general
of the CGTP union, which
along with Portugal’s other
main union the UGT had
called the strike action.
Health and education services were also expected to
be affected.
It was not yet clear how
much of the private sector
would join the strike, but
Volkswagen’s Autoeuropa
factory near Lisbon had said
it would suspend production
yesterday over fears that the
strike would affect its suppliers.
Unions had said they were
hoping that three million
people would protest yesterday, equalling the turnout of
Passengers gather at the Faro international airport in
Algarve during a general strike in Portugal, yesterday
a strike on November 24 last
year against austerity measures proposed by the then
Socialist government.
The current centre-right
government led by Prime
Minister Passos Coelho has
submitted a tough 2012
budget to help reduce the
nation’s huge debt.
After Greece and Ireland
in 2010, Portugal become
the third eurozone member
state needing a bailout in
May when it could no longer
raise fresh funds at sustainable rates on the financial
markets.
Among other measures,
the budget provides for the
suspension of 13th and 14th
month salary payments for
civil servants and pensioners
who earn more than 1,000
euros a month.
Employees in the private
sector will see their working
day increased by 30 minutes
while health and education
spending will be slashed,
topping off a series of measures already adopted in efforts to reduce the deficit.
“It is clear that Portugal
needs a strong mobilisation
because it is inadmissible
that a country follows a logic
of impoverishment... and
not to respond to problems
of employment.” CGTP’s da
Silva said.
Coelho has conceded that
the austerity measures are
even tougher than those required under the EU-IMF
bailout terms but says they
are necessary to ensure its
targets are met in the face of
difficult economic conditions.
It needs to reduce its public deficit from 9.8 percent
of gross domestic product
in 2010 to 5.9 percent by
the end of 2011 but it stood
at 8.3 percent earlier this
year, putting that objective
in doubt.
The forecast for 2012
looks no better, after the
announcement by Finance
Minister Viktor Gaspar
Monday that its economy is
expected to shrink by three
percent in 2012.
Unemployment is also set
to rise to a record rate of 13.4
percent.
Yesterday’s strike follows
protests earlier in the month
by civil servants and soldiers
and a public transport strike
in Lisbon and Porto on November 8.
French nuclear train halted at German border
French anti-riot policemen yesterday stand next to the train carrying highly
radioactive nuclear waste from the La Hague factory (northwestern France)
bound for Gorleben in Germany, passing through Remilly, eastern France
French authorities yesterday ordered a
trainload of reprocessed nuclear waste to
be halted en route to Germany near the
border for 24 hours to try to avoid more
protests.
Riot police battled anti-nuclear protestors when it began its journey in northern France on Wednesday and thousands
more anti-nuclear demonstrators were
expected to try to block it once it crossed
the frontier.
The train was halted at Remilly junction
50 kilometres (30 miles) from the border
while nuclear company Areva, French rail
firm SNCF and police decided which of
three possible routes it can now take, a security source said.
A heavy police presence was deployed
in and around the small town and on the
tracks leading to and from the station,
where a dozen buses full of riot police
were on standby, an AFP reporter at the
scene said.
German police were due to take over
from their French counterparts once the
train, carrying the last German nuclear
waste to be reprocessed in France, resumes its 1,500-kilometre trip to Gorleben in eastern Germany.
Last November a similar convoy took 91
hours to arrive at its final destination – an
entire day longer than planned – as it was
dogged the length of the route by French
and then German protesters.
Spooked by Japan’s Fukushima disaster, Germany has decided to phase out its
use of nuclear power, and thus bring to an
end the controversial practice of sending
radioactive waste overland to France for
reprocessing.
Anti-nuclear activists want France to
follow suit and shut its reactors, an idea
firmly dismissed by President Nicolas
Sarkozy.
The final shipment left a railway yard
in the town of Valognes in Normandy,
northwest France, more than an hour late
Wednesday after police played cat and
mouse with hundreds of activists, firing
teargas and making 16 arrests.
There were no reports of any action by
protesters overnight as the train travelled
across France towards the German border.
There has long been widespread public
opposition in Germany to nuclear power,
which environmentalists believe presents
an unacceptable radioactive threat to public health and the environment.
In the meantime, Germany will no longer send nuclear waste for reprocessing in
France, but will instead stockpile it until a
way is found to make it safe.
The 11 wagons on the train halted yesterday hold the same quantity of “highly
radioactive” waste as the last one – a year
ago – to leave the reprocessing plant at La
Hague for Gorleben, according to pressure group Greenpeace.
29
®
Belarus jails
rights leader
for tax evasion
A Belarus court yesterday jailed a rights leader
opposed to President Alexander Lukashenko’s
regime for four-and-a-half years on charges of
tax evasion based on evidence from two EU
members.
The Minsk city court also confiscated all property
of the banned Vyasna (Spring) organisation’s
leader Ales Beliatsky during a packed hearing
attended by European Union and US diplomats
in Minsk.
“Vyasna will not be stopped,” the 49-year-old declared in court after the verdict was read. His attorney Dmitry Layevsky vowed to file an appeal.
Beliatsky was detained on August 4 after authorities received information from Lithuania
and Poland about bank accounts he held in their
countries to support his work at home.
The two EU members later expressed dismay
that their data had been used to incriminate Beliatsky and issued formal apologies for cooperating with Lukashenko’s authoritarian regime.
Yesterday’s sentencing was preceded by a call
from the European Union to immediately release
the Vyasna leader and for Belarus to drop all
charges against him in the “politically motivated”
case.
“The European Parliament is highly concerned
about the unjustified prosecution and sentencing
of Ales Beliatsky for alleged tax evasion in Belarus,” its head Jerzy Buzek said in a statement
released after the verdict.
Lukashenko, once dubbed the last dictator of
Europe by the United States, has used the trial
to bolster his allegations that European nations
have been trying to organise local opposition
groups in a bid to overthrow the current authorities and win control of the country’s industries.
State television yesterday referred to Beliatsky
as a “failed entrepreneur” who sold his services
to European governments whose sole intent was
to destablise the country’s politics.
EU takes
Germany to court
over Volkswagen
The European Commission decided yesterday
to haul Germany before the top EU court for failing to scrap a law that protects auto giant Volkswagen from takeover bids.
The EU competition watchdog said it would ask
the court to impose fines on Germany for every
day that it fails to cancel the law, which gives the
Land of Lower Saxony the power to block bids
even though it is a minority shareholder.
The commission said the German government
had failed to abide by a previous ruling by the
European Court of Justice in 2007, which found
that the law gave “unjustified special rights” to
public authorities.
“Since Germany has failed to take all the necessary measures to fully comply with the Court’s
judgement, the Commission has now decided to
bring the case before the Court again,” the commission said in a statement.
The EU’s executive arm said it would ask the
court to impose a fine of around 31,000 euros
per day from the date of the 2007 ruling until
Germany complies with the original judgment.
Once the EU judges issue a second ruling, the
commission said it wants the court to impose a
fine of 282,725 euros per day until Germany fully
respects EU rules.
corporate news Times
®
The Temptations to perform in town
The most successful group in black music
history – The Temptations – will perform
at the AmCham Macau Annual Ball at the
Venetian Macao, on December 3.
The Temptations were in the heyday of
their success in the 1960s and 70s, and produced many hit singles. ‘The Way You Do
The Things You Do’ was The Temptations’
first major hit, followed by others like ‘My
Girl,’ ‘Just My Imagination (Running Away
with Me)’ and ‘Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone’.
The group was a part of Berry Gordy,
Jr.’s extremely successful ‘Motown Sound,’
whose associated record labels included
other hit acts like the Jackson 5, Marvin
Gaye and The Supremes.
This year, The Temptations and Motown
are celebrating 50 years of ‘America’s number one male group.’
“The Venetian Macao is a strong supporter of AmCham Macau [the American
Chamber of Commerce in Macau] and the
work they do for Macau,” said Edward
Tracy, Sands China’s president and chief
CTM donates funds
to Tung Sin Tong
C
ompanhia de Telecomunicações
de
Macau (CTM) has
made a donation of MOP
300,000 to Tung Sin Tong in
support of its annual fundraising campaign, as well as
providing free promotional
channel with the aim of raising more charity funds.
“It is an unrelenting effort of CTM to support the
social welfare initiatives of
local charity organisations,”
the company said in a statement.
Representatives of CTM,
led by chief executive officer,
Vandy Poon, paid a visit to
Tung Sin Tong on November
18, and was received by vice
chairman Chui Sai Cheong.
Chui Sai Cheong expressed
gratitude to CTM for its
support of Tung Sin Tong
throughout the years, not
only the charity fund dona-
tion, but also the support of
service level.
Vandy Poon stressed that
“it is the commitment of
CTM to build up a harmonious society, where CTM has
spared no effort to support
the social charity activities
and bridging the gaps in the
society”.
As well as the charity donation, promotional leaflets for
the annual fund raising activity are being distributed to
CTM customers together with
their monthly bill statement,
so as to further arouse public’s attention and to gather
more funds for the needy.
Payments
at 7-Eleven
CTM has now expanded its
bill payment service to all fortyone 7-eleven stores in Macau.
With 7-Eleven’s 24 hours
business structure, CTM
customers can enjoy a more
flexible and convenient payment service.
CTM customers can simply
present their bill with printed barcode to settle payment
by cash at any 7-Eleven in
Macau. Maximum payment
per transaction is MOP
5,000; handling charge of
MOP 1.00 will be levied per
bill, and 7-Eleven will issue
a transaction record in this
regard.
As the daily payment cut-off
time is 5:00 pm, bills should
be settled at or before 5:00
pm on the final due day.
CTM customers can also
settle the bill through other
simple and convenient ways,
such as “CTM eServices”,
by credit card, autopay service, phone banking, mobile banking service or any
ATM.
Graff Diamonds to
open outlets in Macau
Graff Diamonds Ltd., the jewellery retailer
whose founder twice set records buying gems
at auction, plans to open outlets in Macau
next year, Laurence Graff, 73, the chairman
and founder of the London-based company
told Bloomberg TV.
The company plans to use funds from a
proposed share sale to add stores in Asia as
the region’s demand for luxury goods grows.
Currently, the retailer has 32 stores worldwide including in Tokyo, Hong Kong, Shanghai and Taipei.
Graff, who is preparing to raise USD 1 billion in an IPO in Hong Kong next year, according to a person familiar with the matter,
is following other brands, which
are
tapping
Asia’s accelerating demand for
luxury goods as
the
European
and US economies stall.
“Graff is the ideal type of company to be listed in
Hong Kong,” said
Graff at his only
shop in Hong
Kong. “We intend
to open up even more stores in Asia.” He didn’t
elaborate on the company’s share sale plans.
The London-based jeweller’s business in
China is becoming one of its most lucrative,
Graff said, without elaborating.
China surpassed Japan to become the second-biggest buyer of diamonds behind the
US, with demand rising 25 percent last year,
according to De Beers.
The English jeweller is involved in every stage of diamond production, from the
sourcing of rough diamonds to cutting and
polishing and the design of the gem pieces.
“We’re a vertically integrated company so
we can control everything,” said Graff.
30
executive officer.
“We are extremely pleased to be hosting
them for their annual ball this year, and
are especially excited about bringing The
Temptations to perform in their honour.”
The American Chamber of Commerce in
Macau promotes the development of trade,
commerce and investment between the
USA and Macau and provides a forum in
which the American business community
can identify and discuss common commercial interests in Macau.
“AmCham stands at the forefront of development in Macau. With new Americanbased corporations establishing themselves
in Macau, we provide insight and business
connectivity that is unrivalled by any other international chamber,” said vice chair
Reggie Martin.
“We stand as one of the most influential
chambers in Macau, and from retail to
manufacturing, our members represent
a diversity of both interests and relationships.”
The Venetian Macao is hosting this year’s AmCham Macau annual ball, with
special musical guests, R&B legends The Temptations
AirAsia adds to Macau flights
Low-cost carrier AirAsia has increased
the frequency of its flights between Bangkok and Macau to four times a day.
According to the Malaysia-based airline,
the new flight, operated by Thai AirAsia,
will accommodate the increasing demand
during the upcoming peak travel season,
which includes Christmas, New Year and
Chinese New Year.
The new two-way flight will depart Bangkok at 2.45 pm and arrive in Macau at 6.20
pm. The AirAsia plane will then depart
from the MSAR 40 minutes later to arrive
back at Suvarnabhumi Airport at 9.55 pm.
The budget airline’s new schedule will
remain in effect until at least March 24,
2012.
Local flag carrier Air Macau also flies daily
between Bangkok and Macau.
Venetian cuts on ecological footprint
Local resort Venetian Macao has joined
an environmental program to try to reduce
its ecological footprint, developer Las Vegas Sands announced on its official blog.
The Cotai property – the largest single
hotel building in Asia with more than
15,000 staff and over 100,000 visitors a
day – recently signed up with the EarthCheck environmental program.
Over the past year, EarthCheck has
helped more than 1,300 organisations
in over 70 countries to reduce their consumption of natural resources.
As part of Venetian’s partnership with
Earthcheck, the resort will be able to report its carbon footprint per guest night
or square metre, as well as water use per
visitor.
“Environmental sustainability is part of
our corporate commitment to responsible
business. Our vision is to be a leader in
sustainability in our marketplace,” said
Mike Naylor, vice president of facilities
management at Venetian.
“EarthCheck allows us to effectively measure our sustainability outcomes against
an industry recognised baseline and best
practice levels, and to take proactive measures to minimise our carbon footprint,”
he said.
“Many of the benefits of sustainable operations go well beyond the bottom line.
Good environmental and social practices
are increasingly seen as an essential part
of sound corporate governance,” the executive added.
“That’s because sustainable practices help
reduce risk, help manage environmental
impacts, and help position the company
strongly when it comes to securing MICE
[Meetings, Incentives, Conventions and
Exhibitions] events,” he said.
Meanwhile celebrity guests Carina Lau
and Louis Koo will help switch on the
Christmas lights at The Grand Canal
Shoppes today. The event will also feature
Christmas carols sung by The International School of Macao school choir.
Sands China is welcoming a new Christmas charity partner this year – Make-AWish Hong Kong, a foundation that grants
wishes to children with life-threatening
medical conditions.
Times corporate news
®
Portuguese Corner Shop opens in S. Lázaro
T
says Ivo Ferreira. “We
really had to search a lot
to find these old pieces
because we felt that what
we are trying to do here is
not just sell products but
to provide an experience
to our patrons – an experience of authenticity and
quality,” he adds.
For instance the store
stocks the Dr. Bayard’s
cough drops made out of
glucose, althea, honey and
a medicinal plants syrup
that have been fighting
coughs since the end of
World War II.
“The products we have
here, not only symbolize the best Portugal have
been producing as they
also represent our own culture. The grand majority
of these brands here have
been marking generations
after generations,” he says.
For Margarida Vila-Nova
stepping into a new venture is Asia is challenging but definitely exciting.
“For me, it is a chance to
promote my country’s culture in a different way.
These products have been
part of the life of the Portuguese people for so long
that somehow they represent our way of life.”
Photo by Eduardo Magalhães
Footballers made into high-quality figures that “can do
any action” the real ones do – is one of the highlights of a
‘Soccerstars’ collection launched on Wednesday in Macau.
Not exactly an original idea if you are old enough to have
had a collection of tin soldiers and sailors, cowboys and ‘injuns,’ to dream battles and wars with, or even adventures
with the plastic ‘Action Man’ – but it is surely a step forward if seen as providing a football (or soccer) fans his very
own team of stars to play the game.
Something meant for young and old and aiming mainly
to try to re-convey the idea of “sports-no-violence” in football fans, as designer Miguel Augusto of IDreams Creations
puts it.
Augusto added that none of the 2,500 articulated figures
of football players IDreams already made, around 12 inches
tall, replicates known stars, or famous clubs, as his project
aims to have each collector setting up his own made-tofit team of stars, selecting among a range of equipments,
colours and banners, to follow the motto: “Choose the
colours, make your team!”
Originally inspired in a long-time toddler dream of having a football figure that could actually “play” the game,
Augusto never let the idea go and it took years to mature,
finally taking shape four years ago when the project was
kicked off.
On sale at Creative Macau, on the Macau Cultural Centre
as well as online, the IDreams collections is planning to go
further ahead in useful accessories for the so-called “beautiful game” and anonymous “soccerstars”.
Ad
he ‘Portuguese Corner Shop’ opened on
Tuesday at Albergue SCM, in the S. Lázaro
district offering traditional products from Portugal,
which range from gold
handcrafted jewellery to
tinned fish.
The small store, owned by
filmmaker Ivo Ferreira and
his actress wife Margarida
Vila-Nova, offers a mix of
delicatessen,
cosmetics
and traditional handcraft
created in Portugal for the
past two centuries.
And those products include the favourite soaps
of US celebrities Madonna
and Oprah Winfrey, called
‘Ach Brito’, and the olive
oil ‘Monte de Portugal,
which has been recently
considered one of the best
in the world.
The look of the bijou store
is vintage and it reproduces a traditional grocery
shop, including the furnishings, which came all
the way from Portugal. To
add to the effect, the products are also wrapped in
vintage packaging, faithful
to the original design.
“It was not easy to discover these old displays”,
Anonymous ‘Soccerstars’
31
business Times
Lending restrictions
ease for small banks
China’s central bank said yesterday it has eased
lending restrictions on more than 20 small banks
nationwide, as it seeks to channel more funds
to cash-strapped private firms and the farming
sector.
The People’s Bank of China will cut the reserve
requirement ratio for the rural banks by half a
percentage point to 16 percent, effective today,
the central bank said in a statement sent to
AFP.
The group includes six lenders in the eastern
province of Zhejiang, where many privately
owned companies are facing a credit crunch,
said the statement from the central bank’s
Hangzhou city branch.
An official at the headquarters of the central
bank in Beijing confirmed the total number, but
declined to say where the other banks were located.
“All of the more than 20 banks are included [in
the cut],” said the official, who also declined to
be named.
The move, which reduces the amount of funds
banks must set aside, is a sign the government
is selectively easing tight credit restrictions put
in place to curb surging inflation and property
prices.
The central bank said it would maintain its
“prudent monetary policy”, while giving more
credit to support weak parts of the economy
such as the agricultural sector and small
businesses.
Credit restrictions have fuelled an explosion in underground lending as private firms
borrow money at high interest rates from
informal lenders after being rejected by major banks who favour other state-controlled
enterprises.
But the disappearance of more than 90 entrepreneurs in Wenzhou city in Zhejiang, who are
thought to have run away over high debts, has
fuelled concerns that even the informal lending
market could collapse.
China, anxious about rising living costs, has
pulled on a variety of levers to curb price rises
in the past 18 months, including restricting the
amount of money banks can lend and hiking interest rates.
But the central bank has said recently it would
“fine-tune” monetary policy amid growing concerns that the weak global economy is increasing the risk of a hard landing for China.
®
Asian shares mixed on
German bond auction
A
sian shares were mixed
yesterday as fears about
Europe’s debt crisis
deepened after Germany, considered the pillar of the eurozone, failed to sell all its bonds
in an auction.
While some markets managed to eke out small gains
thanks to bargain-buying,
the ongoing woes in Europe
as well as the slowing global
economy pushed investors to
the sidelines.
Tokyo fell 1.80 percent, or
149.56 points, to 8,165.18 as
it played catch-up with regional losses on Wednesday,
when it was closed for a public holiday.
Sydney slipped 0.17 percent,
or 6.8 points, to 4,044.2.
But Hong Kong gained 0.40
percent, or 70.67 points, to
17,935.10 and Seoul closed 0.67
percent, or 11.96 points, higher
at 1,795.06 while Shanghai was
up 0.10 percent, or 2.48 points,
at 2,397.55.
A German government bond
auction Wednesday drew some
of the weakest demand since
the introduction of the euro,
signalling diminishing investor appetite even for the safest
eurozone assets.
German bonds are considered the gold standard of eurozone debt.
Berlin only managed to
draw bids of 3.9 billion euros for its six-billion-euro
10-year bond auction, indicating that investors are now
sceptical about even the saf-
est assets in the eurozone.
The failure comes days after
Moody’s warned that France’s
weak growth and exposure to
European debt could see it lose
its cherished AAA debt rating,
which would send its borrowing costs soaring.
“It’s OK as long as money
is floating from bad assets to
good ones, but now investment
money itself is shrinking,” Kenichi Hirano, operating officer at
Tachibana Securities, told Dow
Jones Newswires.
Austria’s central bank head
and European Central Bank
(ECB) governing council
member Ewald Nowotny
called it an “alarm signal”, but
the German Finance Agency
said it was a “reflection of the
extraordinarily nervous market conditions”.
A spokesman insisted it does
not mean any refinancing bottleneck.
With bond yields for Spain
and Italy sitting close to the
seven percent level considered
too high for governments to
service their debts, there are
fears that the eurozone project
could unravel and the global
economy suffer another meltdown.
“There was a substantial collapse in the euro after the German auction, and it looks like
the global economy is going
down while the core of Europe
is also facing problems,” said
Thomas Harr, head of Asian
FX strategy at Standard Chartered.
However, the euro managed to hold off from any
further fall after tumbling in
Ex-Olympus Woodford to meet Japan investigators
Swiss nuclear
shutdown,
16.8 billion euro
Shutting down Switzerland’s five nuclear power
stations will cost about 20.7 billion Swiss francs
(16.8 billion euros) and take about 20 years,
Swiss authorities said yesterday.
A study published by the Federal Office of Energy said that the cost had risen by 10.0 percent
compared with a 2006 estimate.
The most expensive part of the process will be
the long-term management of radioactive waste,
it said.
The Swiss parliament approved a phased exit
from nuclear energy at the end of September,
six months after the Fukushima plant catastrophe in Japan.
Strong public opposition to nuclear led to a recommendation that Switzerland’s five reactors
not be replaced when they come to the end of
their operation in 2034.
A huge earthquake and tsunami on March 11
knocked out cooling systems at Fukushima,
sending reactors into meltdown and leaking radiation in what was the world’s worst nuclear accident since Chernobyl in 1986.
New York late Wednesday in
the wake of the German auction failure.
The common currency
bought USD 1.3395 compared
with USD 1.3347 late Wednesday in New York, where it
plunged from USD 1.3507. It
also fetched 103.33 yen from
103.15 yen. The dollar was at
77.13 yen, down from 77.29 in
New York.
Compounding
Europe’s
troubles was data Wednesday showing manufacturing
in China’s huge economy had
slumped in November, while
Washington said US growth
was not as fast as first thought
in the third quarter.
Financial stocks were under
pressure after the US Federal
Reserve said earlier this week
it will stress-test 31 major US
banks next year, raising fears
they will need to keep more
cash in reserve, further squeezing liquidity.
The leaders of Germany,
France and Italy – the eurozone’s three-largest economies
– are due to meet yesterday to
find a way to calm the troubled
bloc’s bond markets.
On oil markets New York’s
main contract for January delivery gained 24 cents to USD
96.41 per barrel while Brent
North Sea crude for delivery in
January advanced 60 cents to
USD 107.62.
Gold was trading at USD
1,698.30 an ounce by 1040
GMT, from USD 1,695.15 late
Wednesday. (AFP)
Former Olympus president Michael Woodford (C) meets with reporters
upon his arrival at Narita airport, suburban Tokyo on Wednesday
The ousted chief of scandal-hit Olympus, Michael Woodford, yesterday began meeting Japanese investigators
over a cover-up of huge investment
losses dating back to the 1990s, pledging the truth would out.
The Briton is in Japan for the first
time since Olympus abruptly stripped
him of his title on October 14, only six
months after appointing him its first
ever non-Japanese president and two
weeks after he was also named chief
executive.
32
Woodford, who blew the whistle on
the scandal at the camera and medical equipment maker, held talks with
prosecutors in Tokyo, where a special
white collar crime unit is examining
the matter.
“I have several files I wish to give
them,” he told reporters as he arrived
at the Ministry of Justice to discuss
Olympus’ overpayments in a series of
acquisition deals that have also led to
probes by British and US authorities.
“I want to provide information, and
have dialogue,” said Woodford, who
was also due to meet Tokyo police and
government regulators before addressing the international press.
Olympus said at the time that Woodford was ousted because of cultural differences – despite his 30-year career
with the group.
But Woodford has contended that he
was sacked because he questioned the
acquisitions and enormous fees paid to
little-known consultants based in the
Cayman Islands, and because of his
calls on the then chairman to resign.
Local media have reported that the
losses may total more than 100 billion
yen (USD 1.3 billion). But the company has yet to disclose details, citing
a probe by an outside panel commissioned by its board.
Woodford – who major shareholders and retired employees have called
to be reinstated – plans to attend the
company board meeting today to push
for a deeper investigation into the mismanagement.
Britain’s Serious Fraud Office has
also launched an investigation, along
with those under way by Japanese and
other international agencies amid media speculation that Yakuza crime syndicates may be involved.
Times infotainment
®
The Born Loser by Chip Sansom
Weather
China
Min
Beijing
Harbin
Tianjin
Urumqi
Xi’an
Lhasa
Chengdu
Chongqing
Kunming
Nanjing
Shanghai
Wuhan
Hangzhou
Taipei
Guangzhou
Hong Kong
-3
-15
-1
-3
4
-4
11
15
4
5
9
7
6
18
16
20
Asia-Pacific
Seoul
Tokyo
Manila
Hanoi
Ho Chi Minh City
Bangkok
Kuala Lumpur
Singapore
New Delhi
Mumbai
Karachi
Jakarta
B.S. Begawan
Sydney
Melbourne
Brisbane
World
Min
-1
7
22
17
22
23
24
24
14
20
22
24
24
18
13
21
Min
Moscow
Frankfurt
Paris
London
New York
-5
-1
6
9
2
Max
6
-4
8
0
12
12
19
22
19
16
18
19
17
26
24
23
cloudy
clear
cloudy/clear
cloudy
cloudy
clear
cloudy
cloudy
clear
clear
clear/cloudy
cloudy
clear
cloudy
cloudy
cloudy
Max
8
14
29
23
33
32
32
31
28
35
30
33
30
21
24
26
Condition
cloudy
fine
showers
cloudy
showers
cloudy
thunderstorms
thunderstorms
fog
fine
fine
rain
thunderstorms
rain
rain
showers
Max
0
8
13
12
10
Condition
Easy
Easy +
Medium
Hard
Condition
cloudy/snow
clear
clear
cloudy/overcast
clear
Crossword puzzles provided by BestCrosswords.com
Across
Your Stars
Aries
Taurus
Gemini
Cancer
March 21-April 19
April 20-May 20
May 21-June 21
June 22-July 22
You are attracted to anything new, though
sometimes not for very long. Today, you
spot something that look really exciting, and
it’s a great idea to follow up on it. Things
could lead almost anywhere!
This is not the time for drama or trying out
crazy ideas -- though it’s a safe bet that
some of your people are doing just that. Try
your best to rein them in, or at least help
them cope with the consequences.
Your opinions are all over the map today,
but that’s cool -- in fact, you often like it
better that way! Your mental energy isn’t
scattered, though, just because you’ve
adopted a few contradictory positions.
A friend or ally needs some persuasion to
do what’s right today, but you can’t go for
the gut -- not yet, anyway! They need to
hear the logical reasons why your plan is
the best one.
Leo
Virgo
Libra
Scorpio
July 23-August 22
August 23-September 22
September 23-October 22
October 23 - November 21
The same old routines just aren’t going to
work out that well today. That doesn’t mean
you’re doomed -- just that you need to
experiment and try a few new approaches
to your problems.
You need to tweak your routines today, or at
least find some new ways to get your work
done. It’s a really good time for you to shake
things up -- nobody can see it coming, and
you can improve things dramatically!
Your social intuition is quite strong right
now so make sure that you’re asking the
right questions and hanging out with all the
right people. You can make almost anything
happen if you push it!
You need to change things around the
house -- no matter what anyone else says!
If you live alone, go nuts, but if you have
roommates or family members involved,
things could get pretty hairy.
Sagittarius
Capricorn
Aquarius
Pisces
November 22-December 21
December 22-January 19
January 20-February 18
February 19-March 20
You should do whatever it takes to reconnect
with your people today -- things are pretty
crazy! The good news is that you’re the right
kind of crazy, so you can surf the vibe with
great ease.
Cash flow is an issue today -- though if
you’re lucky, you have more than you know
what to do with! In any case, you need to
tighten things up so that your economy is as
efficient as can be.
Those who question your brain power live to
regret it, and today shows why that’s true.
One quick inspiration is worth ten thousand
mundane ideas -- and that’s all they can
come up with today!
The future is always at least a little mysterious
-- and that’s why you spend so much time
pondering it! You love a good enigma, and right
now, you might be dreaming up some serious
weirdness for tomorrow or next week.
1- Memoranda; 5- Agile; 9- Employees; 14- On ___ with; 15- It has its
ups and downs; 16- Cartoon part; 17- Romeo’s last words; 18- Cabbage
salad; 19- Chief of the Vedic gods; 20- Small end-blown flute; 22- Tree
cutting; 24- Misfortunes; 25- Surprisingly; 26- Low bow; 29- Hackneyed;
31- Does in; 32- Roman censor; 33- Monetary unit of Romania; 36Cookbook abbr.; 37- Plague; 40- Takes too much; 41- Brillo rival; 42Bottom of the barrel; 43- “The Zoo Story” playwright; 45- Loses color;
47- 1986 sci-fi sequel; 48- Have high hopes; 51- Bingo call; 52- Floating
mass; 54- Collection of weaponry; 58- Paris subway; 59- Hindu princess;
61- Leeds’s river; 62- For want of ___...; 63- Latin 101 word; 64- Toll rds.;
65- I cannot ___ lie; 66- Egg part; 67- “___ quam videri” (North Carolina’s
motto);
Down
1- Enticement; 2- High hair style; 3- Chief; 4- Toll-free highway; 5- Method; 6Warsaw residents; 7- Handwoven Scandinavian rug; 8- Loud yell; 9- Faucet;
10- Snarl; 11- Actress MacDowell; 12- Plants with fronds; 13- National
symbols; 21- Browned sliced bread; 23Yesterday’s solution
Gibson garnish; 26- Concordes, e.g.;
27- “______ sprach Zarathustra”; 28Drinks (as a cat); 29- Domesticates; 30AAA recommendations; 32- Algonquian
language; 33- Ear part; 34- Biblical
garden; 35- Brings into play; 38- More
mature; 39- Stories; 44- Striped; 45Threadlike structure; 46- Ring of color;
47- In danger; 48- Draw a bead on; 49Part of an act; 50- Flower segment; 51Commonplace; 53- Between white and
black; 55- Bites; 56- Places of refuge;
57- ___ majeste; 60- Latin 101 verb;
Crossword puzzles provided by BestCrosswords.com
Useful telephone numbers
Emergency calls 999
Fire department 28 572 222
PJ (Open line) 993
PJ (Picket) 28 557 775
PSP 28 573 333
Customs 28 559 944
S. Januário Hospital 28 313 731
Kiang Wu Hospital 28 371 333
Commission Against Corruption
(CCAC) 28326 300
IACM 28 387 333
Tourism 28 882 184
Airport 59 888 88
Taxi (Yellow) 28 519 519
Taxi (Black) 28 939 939
Utilities
Water Supply – Report 1990 992
Telephone – Report 1000
Electricity – Report 28 339 922
Macau Daily Times 28 716 081
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33
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Thousands,
all over the World
read the
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every day
www.macaudailytimes.com.mo
34
Times SPORTS
Tennis
Djokovic feeling the
strain of campaign N
ovak Djokovic admits he is feeling the
strain of his remarkably successful season after
the Serb was crushed 6-3, 6-1
by Spain’s David Ferrer at the
ATP World Tour Finals.
Djokovic has enjoyed one of
the greatest campaigns in tennis history after winning three
Grand Slam titles and five
Masters crowns.
But the 24-year-old has
struggled with back and shoulder injuries since landing the
US Open and his results have
tailed off in recent weeks.
On the evidence of Wednesday’s lacklustre effort against
Ferrer at London’s O2 Arena,
the Tour Finals might be a
tournament too far for Djokovic, although he can still
qualify for the semi-finals with
a win over compatriot Janko
Tipsarevic today.
Djokovic was completely
out-played as he suffered
only his fifth defeat in 75
matches this year and he
conceded his “worst” loss of
the year was the inevitable
result of playing so hard
for so long over the last 11
months.
“All the credit to David, he
played a great match but I just
wasn’t there,” Djokovic said.
“Maybe it’s because of the
length of the season. It was
the worst match I’ve played
this season so far with so
many unforced errors. I’m not
playing well. That’s a fact.”
Djokovic believes that in
hindsight his decision to play
in the Davis Cup for Serbia so
soon after his US Open final
triumph against Rafael Nadal
was the wrong move.
Rather than take time out to
recharge his batteries, Djokovic put his already aching
limbs under more stress and
he is finally paying the price.
Djokovic could still extend his
season for another few days if
he beats Tipsarevic in the final
round of Group A matches, but
judging by his resigned expression when questioned about his
chances it would be no surprise
to see his dream year end with
one more defeat.
“There is still a chance. But
if I don’t play at least 50 percent better than I did tonight,
I don’t think I’ll have any
chance,” he said.
Swiss world number 17,
Stanislas Wawrinka will start
the new year by defending his
title at the USD 450,000 ATP
Chennai Open tennis tournament from January 2-8, organisers said yesterday.
Wawrinka, who beat Xavier Malisse of Belgium in this
year’s final, will make his
fourth successive appearance in South Asia’s only
ATP event in the southern
Indian city of Chennai.
The tournament also features world number nine
Janko Tipsarevic of Serbia,
number 10 Nicolas Almagro
of Spain, Malisse and former
Chennai Open champion
Marin Cilic of Croatia.
World number 31 Milos Raonic, the 20-year-old from
Canada who is regarded as
one of the brightest prospects on the circuit, will also
play in Chennai, the organis-
ers said in a statement.
The tournament on the
hard courts of the Nungambakkam Tennis Stadium,
will serve as a warm-up for
the season’s first Grand
Slam, the Australian Open,
which starts in Melbourne
on January 16.
David Ferrer of Spain makes a return to Novak Djokovic of Serbia during their at
ATP World Tour tennis finals group match held in London. Ferrer won 6-3, 6-1
Wawrinka to defend Chennai Open title
Cycling
Contador in final CAS
plea over doping charge
Spanish cyclist Alberto Contador
leaves after the last day of a
hearing at the Court of Arbitration
for Sport (CAS) in Lausanne,
Switzerland
Spanish cyclist Alberto Contador, who
is fighting a bid to impose a doping ban
which could strip him of his 2010 Tour
de France win, pled his case before a
panel yesterday.
The three-time Tour de France champion addressed a closed hearing at the
Lausanne-based Court of Arbitration
for Sports, which has been charged
with examining if minute traces of
clenbuterol found in a urine sample in
2010 is proof that Contador used drugs
to enhance his performance.
Contador emerged red-eyed from
the building shortly before 1:00 pm
(1200 GMT) and got into a taxi with his
brother Fran without addressing waiting media.
CAS secretary general Matthieu Reeb
said the cyclist spoke for about 15 minutes on the last day of the case.
More than 20 witnesses have given evidence since it opened on Monday at CAS
headquarters before being moved to the
International Olympic Committee, also
in Lausanne, so as to ensure simultaneous translation during the trial.
No ruling is expected before 2012.
The Spanish Cycling Federation
(RFEC) initially cleared Contador of
any wrongdoing after he claimed his
sample had been contaminated by a
steak which he ate on the second rest
day of the 2010 Tour de France.
That ruling allowed Contador to continue competing, but the International
Cycling Union (UCI) and the World
Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) filed appeals to CAS.
A file of some 4,000 pages is being examined by the court chaired by Israeli
lawyer Efraim Barack, who is assisted
by Swiss Quentin Byrne-Sutton and
German Ulrich Hass.
If CAS upholds the appeals the Spaniard faces a competition ban and being
stripped of his 2010 Tour de France title and the Giro d’Italia, which he won
for a second time this year, and any
other victories since July 2010.
35
®
Khalil to
replace Khan on
Bangladesh tour
Cricket
Pakistan yesterday named left-arm paceman Mohammad
Khalil to replace an injured Junaid Khan in the squad for the
Bangladesh tour kicking off with a Twenty20 next week.
Khan, 21, was ruled out of Pakistan’s fifth and final oneday against Sri Lanka on Wednesday and returned home
after injuring his abdominal muscle.
“Khalil will replace Khan in the squad for Bangladesh tour,”
the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) said in a statement.
Khalil took 79 wickets in the last first-class season in Pakistan and has also been amongst the top wicket takers in the
current season with 43.
Pakistan plays one Twenty20, three one-day internationals and two Tests on their tour of Bangladesh. The tour will
start with the Twenty20 in Dhaka on Tuesday.
Besides Khan, allrounder Abdul Razzaq is also in doubt for
the Bangladesh tour with a shoulder injury. PCB has not yet
named any replacement for Razzaq.
Tendulkar on
course for
100th century
Sachin Tendulkar stayed on course for an unprecedented 100th international century as India made a strong reply on the third day of the third and final Test against the
West Indies yesterday.
The master batsman was unbeaten on 67 while Rahul
Dravid (82) completed 13,000 Test runs as India reached
281-3 in their first innings at stumps in reply to the West
Indies’ 590 at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai.
Tendulkar has so far added 57 for the unfinished fourthwicket stand with Venkatsai Laxman (32 not out) with
India now needing 110 more runs to avoid the follow-on
with seven wickets in hand.
“We could have a full house tomorrow [today] with the
little master on 67, but we also have plans to break a few
Indian hearts. It should be an interesting day,” said West
Indies skipper Darren Sammy.
“There is still a lot of time left and the game is about the
first session tomorrow, how quickly we get the wickets.”
Tendulkar’s 133-ball knock included an uppercut for six
off paceman Fidel Edwards. He played handsomely, delighting the nearly 20,000 spectators in the 32,000-capacity stadium.
But he was lucky to survive on 58 when wicket-keeper
Carlton Baugh dropped a difficult chance off leg-spinner
Devendra Bishoo.
Tendulkar’s 99 international centuries are almost evenly
split between the Test and one-day format.
Dravid batted confidently during his 149-ball knock to
become only the second batsman after Tendulkar (15,153)
to score 13,000 Test runs when he drove seamer Sammy
through the covers for four.
He also completed 1,000 Test runs in the year for the
third time in his career.
India lost openers Gautam Gambhir (55) and freescoring Virender Sehwag (37) before the world’s top two
run-getters, Dravid and Tendulkar, added 86 for the third
wicket.
India lead 2-0 in the series after winning the opening
Test in New Delhi by five wickets and the second match in
Kolkata by an innings and 15 runs.
Indian batsman Sachin Tendulkar watches the ball after
playing a shot during the third day’s play, third Test
between India and West Indies in Mumbai yesterday
®
advertisement
China chemical plant blast: 6,000 evacuated
Around 6,000 people were evacuated yesterday after an explosion at a chemical plant near the southern
Chinese city of Guangzhou, state media reported.
The accident occurred early afternoon at the Futian
Chemical Company in Panyu district, Xinhua news
agency said, quoting the local government.
Residents were evacuated after “a small amount” of
toxic hydrogen chloride gas was detected in the air following the blast, Xinhua said.Friday 25 November 2011
Industrial accidents are common in China and people who
live close to industrial sites frequently express concern about
the effect of hazardous pollutants on their health.
Fourteen workers were killed Saturday in an explosion at a chemical plant in east China.
Closing News
Nine new entries
on UNESCO
‘intangible heritage’
M
ongolian
folk
songs played on ancient flutes and the
art of Yimakan storytelling by
China’s ethnic Hezhen were
among nine traditions added
yesterday to UNESCO’s list of
“intangible heritage” in need
of preservation.
Envoys on Indonesia’s resort island of Bali picked the
new listings among 18 entries
from 24 nations to add to the
UN cultural agency’s list of
traditions in need of urgent
protection, including Indonesia’s own Saman dance.
The other new entries include Mauritania’s Moorish
epic T’heydinn poems; Yaok-
wa, an indigenous Brazilian
drought ritual; and Vietnam’s
Xoan singing, practised in sacred places of Phu Tho province during spring.
Also newly listed is the secret
society of Koredugaw, a rite
of wisdom by the Bambara,
Malinke, Senufo and Samogo
peoples of Mali, UNESCO
said on its website. The Koredugaw are a group of initiates who provoke laughter
with behaviour characterised
by gluttony, caustic humour
and wit, but who also possess
great intelligence and wisdom, it said.
More listings will be considered Friday, said UNESCO
spokesman Rasul Samadov.
Iran secured two spots on
the list, the first with it oldest
form of dramatic story-telling, Naqqa-li, which recounts
tales in verse or prose accompanied by gestures and movements.
The building and sailing of
Lenjes, traditional boats used
in the Gulf, was also listed.
“While keeping the traditional aspects of the elements,
we are pro-revitalising them
for the younger generations,
using the equipment available to us in modern times
to progress,” said Yadollah
Parmoun from the Iranian
delegation.
UNESCO said the meeting on Bali had been mostly
funded by Indonesia, which
won a place on the list with
its colourful clapping Saman
dance, “the dance of a thousand hands”.
Indonesia had pledged USD
10 million to preserve the
dance should it be added to
the list.
“From the government’s
side, having the Saman inscription means we will promote the dance to keep it
alive in the community,” a
spokesman for the Indonesian delegation said.
Like the 215 traditions already listed, the new additions met criteria to prove
they faced “grave threats as
a result of which it cannot be
expected to survive without
immediate safeguarding”.
“All the elements inscribed
today met all the criteria.
Many did not meet one or two
criteria, and they were not included,” Samadov said.
UNESCO itself has faced
an uncertain future since the
United States last month suspended funding to the agency
in a row over the Palestinians’
bid for UN membership.
New arrest in neo-Nazi murder probe
‘Make or break’
time for eurozone:
Olli Rehn
EU commissioner for Economic and
Monetary Affairs Olli Rehn
Rehn said what was needed were “courageous
and determined decisions without delay in next
week’s EU meetings” of the eurozone group in
Brussels on November 29.
The Finn said that beating the current crisis required proactive stabilisation and strengthening
of the union, as well as the correction of imbalances.
“Without this, the [proposed] eurobond would
become junk bonds that no one would want, neither European nor other states,” he declared.
Ad
The eurozone crisis has placed the monetary
union at a critical crossroads that could make
or break the single currency, EU Economic
and Monetary Affairs Commissioner Olli Rehn
warned yesterday.
“Ahead lies either the slow disintegration of
the euro area or a significant strengthening of
the monetary union,” Rehn told journalists in
Helsinki.
Rehn declined comment on the disappointing
outcome of a German bond auction Wednesday, when just 3.9 billion of 6.0 billion euros in
government bonds were taken up by investors.
“It is not our practice to comment on day-today developments in the markets,” Rehn said,
but added that “the situation is very serious” as
the contagion from the Greek debt crisis had
now touched the heart of the EU.
“The contagion effect that started in Greece
and spread to different EU countries has recently affected countries close to the heart of the
EU area and has now touched even the hardest
core of the EU,” he said.
Acehnese men perform the Saman dance in Banda Aceh, the capital of Aceh province
(File photo: December 22, 2010)
German authorities made a fresh arrest yesterday in the probe of a neo-Nazi cell believed to be behind 10 murders
of mainly Turkish shopkeepers that has
deeply embarrassed the country’s leaders.
The GSG9 elite anti-terror police unit
captured a 32-year-old alleged accomplice identified only as Andre E. in the
eastern city of Potsdam and searched
four homes, the federal prosecutor’s office said in a statement.
It said the suspect is under investigation for “supporting a terrorist network,” the National Social Underground
(NSU), which is believed to have gunned
down the 10 victims in a decade-long
killing spree across the country.
Prosecutors said Andre E. had close
contact with NSU members since 2003
and is suspected of making a chilling
video in 2007 – discovered only this
month – in which the militants claimed
responsibility for the murders.
“The suspect will appear before an investigating judge of the Federal Court
of Justice in the course of the day,” the
statement said. The office declined to
provide further information.
Two members of the NSU were found
dead this month in an apparent suicide
while a third suspect, a 36-year-old
woman, turned herself in but has reportedly refused to talk to police.
Another man, 37, has been detained
on charges of aiding and abetting the
group as police search for further accomplices.
The case has sparked allegations that
the country may have turned a blind
eye to the threat posed by right-wing
extremism, despite Germany’s deepseated shame over its Nazi past.
And it has revived calls by political
leaders including Chancellor Angela
Merkel to examine a potential ban of the
neo-Nazi National Democratic Party, after an attempt that was struck down by
the constitutional court in 2003. Parliament on Tuesday approved a cross-party motion acknowledging gross errors
made in investigating the murders and
keeping tabs on the far right.
Yesterday, the country’s president,
Christian Wulff, announced there would
be a remembrance service in February.
Berlin has already pledged to compensate financially the victims’ families
Glimpse of year’s last solar eclipse
The tip of South Africa, Tasmania and
most of New Zealand will – weather
permitting – enjoy a partial eclipse of
the Sun today although the handful of
hardy scientists in Antarctica will get
the best view, according to astronomers.
Partial eclipses occur when a fraction
of the Moon obscures the Sun, and to
those in its shadow a “bite” seems to
have been taken out of the solar face.
The longest duration of today’s eclipse
will be at 0621 GMT, at a point east of
the Antarctic peninsula.
36
It will be the last of four partial solar
eclipses this year. The previous ones
occurred on January 4, June 1 and
July 1.
The last Sun-Moon-Earth alignment
in 2011 occurs on December 10, with a
total lunar eclipse visible from Europe,
East Africa, Asia, Australia, the Pacific
and North America, according to veteran NASA expert Fred Espenak.
A simulation of the pathway of Friday’s eclipse can be found on http://
www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/solareclipse-november-25-2011.html

Friday, November 25, 2011 - Edition no. 1468

Transcription

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