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The buzz inside Macau's new casino halls may suggest a revival of the gambling mecca's economy, but for the likes of Ho Heng Kuok, the chips are down.
The head of a small labour union tucked away in a deserted, run-down shopping centre, Ho says the growing ranks of blue-collar labourers like himself have suffered more than gained from the former Portuguese colony's economic renaissance.
They are battling competition from an influx of cheap, often illegal Chinese labourers, rising living costs and corruption.
"The people have lost confidence and patience in the Government," said Ho, president of the Macau Workers Union.
Last week frustration boiled over at a May Day labour march in the normally apolitical city on China's southern tip: in ugly scenes, police fired warning shots into the air and used batons and dogs to control some 6000 workers and civil servants.
The transformation of Macau, an enclave of Unesco world heritage buildings an hour's boat ride from Hong Kong, has been nothing short of remarkable since Portugal handed it back to Chinese rule in 1999.
The liberalisation of its once-monopolistic gaming sector lured in the likes of Las Vegas gaming barons Sheldon Adelson and Steve Wynn. Their resort-style casinos sent GDP soaring and flushed the sleepy enclave with higher-paying jobs, driving it past Las Vegas as the world's biggest gaming market.
"All these things are so positive, but the people don't feel that they are enjoying this, so there's a kind of gap in their expectancy, a discrepancy in the community," said Larry So of the Macau Polytechnic Institute.
Macau legislators like Jose Coutinho say the May Day clash signalled deep-seated resentment towards the Government for failing to redistribute wealth fairly.
"It's the culmination of abuse of power that has been running since after the handover," said Coutinho, a Macanese of Portuguese descent and also president of the Macau Civil Servant's Union, which joined in last week's march.
"Abuse of power, not applying the rule of law and poor transparency has resulted in heavy corruption at the highest level."
Last December, Secretary for Transport and Public Works Au Man Long was arrested in a high-profile corruption case, accused of taking millions in bribes from public project contractors.
The enclave has also been tainted by allegations of murky financial dealings, among them transactions that led to the freezing of North Korean funds at Banco Delta Asia.
Away from Macau's poorest districts and agitating unionists, Macau's conservative Chinese public has kept largely quiet and happily plucked the new economic fruits.
"There's a new middle class coming up in the community simply because more young people are joining the casinos," said So, who teaches social work.
"I have kids studying for a year or so, then whoosh, off they go to work in the casinos as dealers."
But Government figures show that of Macau's 295,000-strong working population, around 20 per cent live on less than 4500 yuan ($796) per month.
Inflation has also shot up, particularly housing and rental prices, further straining blue collar wages.
- REUTERS
