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Spanish soccer giant Barcelona is to play China's Shenzhen Jianlibao, champion of the 2004 Chinese Super League, in Macau this August.   
 
According to Xinhua News Agency, Cheung Lup Kuan, president of the hosting Macau Football Association, said the two teams will draw on August 3 to mark the reopening of the Macau Stadium.

The sports venue has been under reconstruction for the forthcoming East Asian Games, scheduled for October.

Cheung said the football match will help the hosts to test the organizing capability for the Games, adding that it will also hopefully give a boost to Macau's football fancy.

Barcelona has pledged to bring all its talented players including De Assis Moreira Ronaldinho, a top Brazilian playmaker, to the duel. 

An association sent a petition letter to Macao Daily News, which announced an increase of retail price from 1 July, requesting to suspend the decision.

However, no one from the largest-selling Chinese-language newspaper received the letter.

Macao Daily News announced on 29th that increasing cost in papers and decreasing profit margins of wholesalers prompted the decision to increase the retail price from 3 Patacas (US$0.38) to 4 Patacas (US$0.50).

The association who sent the petition said that a survey by the General Association of Trades Union shows that many people do not currently enjoy pay rises, although inflation continues. They worried that the newspaper's decision will lead to a wave of price increase by a series of public utilities, adding pressure to grassroots.

The Small and Medium Enterprises Association opposed the trade union bill, which will be deliberated at the Legislative Assembly today (30 June).

Stanley Au Chong Kit, the head of the Board of Directors who is also a member of the legislature, told press that he will cast a no vote at the meeting.

The Association claimed that the bill will divide the community, and deliberating it right before the election will “confuse the minds of voters”.

The Association worried that the bill will worsen labour relations, affect the willingness of local businessmen to invest and foreign investment.

They also claimed that “99% of the SMEs” had already suffered as a result of the rapid economic development in Macau in recent years. The introduction of the bill will “infringe the spirit of Basic Law”, for granting workers, civil servants and medical workers rights to strike and negotiations.

A member of the central government liaison office in Macau appealed to Macanese representatives to stand for the forthcoming Legislative Assembly election.

Deputy Director Xu Ze met these representatives before they set off for Beijing on 3 July, on a five-day visit at the invitation of the State Council.

Luís Sales Marques, formerly the President of the Municipal Council of Macau, is speculated by Portuguese-language newspapers to stand for the election, is one of the 14 members of the delegation to visit Beijing, headed by Legislator Leonel Alves.

A special General Assembly convened by the Sociedade de Turismo e Diversões de Macau (STDM) unanimously approved the expulsion of Winnie Ho as a Director of the largest gaming firm in Macau.

There had been differences between STDM's boss Stanley Ho and Winnie Ho, his sister, over a variety of issues, including disputes of money.

Ina Chan and Angela Leong will be aded as Directors in lieu of Winnie Ho.

Ambrose So, President of the GA, said that the inclusion of the two will add stability of the company.

The decision to expel Winnie Ho is still yet to be approved by the Court, and all shareholders refused to provide further details on how Chan and Leong managed to obtain shares of the firm.

Meanwhile, Winnie Ho released a statement to the media, accusing Stanley Ho of being “arrogant”.

She also claimed that she had notified to STDM that her shares will be donated to a foundation under her name, and she had withdrawn from Portuguese nationality in May, meaning that disputes in shares in STDM will no longer be able to be resolved under Portuguese law.

She also reinstated that STDM is still owing her bonus of 3 billion Patacas (US$375 million), which Stanley Ho calimed that his company owes her only about 100 million (12.5 million).

Information from the Statistics and Census Bureau indicates that total land area of Macau measured 27.5 sq. km in 2004 and the population density was 16,921 persons per sq. km.

Green area was 5.9 sq. km, while per capita green area was 12.8 sq. m.

At the end of 2004, number of trees planted on roadside in the Macao Peninsula totalled 6,591, up 12.4% over 2003, while the number of trees in the replantation area of the Islands increased 6.1% compared with 2003.

In 2004, level of air quality observed at the 4 monitoring stations was classified as Good in most of the days; the best air quality was in July. The Northern District monitoring station recorded a total of 33 days when the value of respirable suspended particulates was above the standard. Besides, the Ka Ho monitoring station recorded the lowest pH value of rainwater, at 3.7 (precipitation with pH value lower than 5.6 is classified as acid rain).

The quality of drinking water of the distribution networks and the Water Treatment Plants was classified as “in good drinking condition” by the Laboratory of the Civic and Municipal Affairs Bureau.

In 2004, water quality of all public swimming pools was appraised as “A” grade; water quality of the Cheoc Van and Hac Sa beaches was classified as “Acceptable”.

Volume of domestic waste (155,000 tonnes) and commercial and industrial waste (52,000 tonnes) collected by the Companhia de Sistemas de Resíduos (CSR) in 2004 increased by 0.3% and 11.9% respectively compared with 2003.

In addition, volume of waste sent to the Incineration Plant rose 3.0% over 2003 to 256,000 tonnes. The daily average of waste water treated by the Waste Water Treatment Plants (WWTP) of Macao was 151,000 cubic m, an increase of 13.0% over 2003.

In 2004, Public Security Police received 2,695 cases of noise complaints, up 4.2% over 2003. The principal causes of the complaints were related to noises from Construction work, Conversation and shouting, as well as Music and karaoke. At the same time, the Environment Council received 76 complaints about noise, a significant increase of 52.0% over 2003.

The Civic and Municipal Affairs Bureau and the Environment Council organised 59 promotional activities; total expenses amounted to 2.99 million Patacas (US$ 374,000) and participation of more than 160,000 persons in these activities.

A Canadian professor said that Macau's chances to win the bid for the enlistment of the World Heritage are quite high.

Herb Stovel, a Carleton University professor who is also a member of a consultative committee of Unesco, said that Macau indeed has done a lot of work in protecting heritage, having visited the place for four to five times now.

He said that Unesco seldom gives negative comments to World Heritage applications. Should application be failed, suggestions are made by Unesco for improvement. Macau has given Unesco “a positive impression”, so the chances for Macau's success to be enlisted as World Heritage are quite high.

Stovel is in Macau to deliver a talk on the protection and management of heritage in a developing society. He said that cultural tourism should benefit the local economy in along term, but also suggested to maintain distance between new development projects and heritage sites, so that the two can exist together in a balanced way.

The Angolan community in Macau will collaborate with a local TV station to film a documentary to celebrate the 30th anniversary of Angola's independence and establishment of diplomatic relations with mainland China.

The Teledifusão de Macau (TDM) will produce the documentary in four languages, and plans to show it in Macau, mainland China and other Portuguese-speaking countries.

Some 1,000 video CDs will also be produced, under the agreement between TDM and the Angola Association Macau (AAM).

Supply over demand prompts the Government's decision to close down two of its kindergartens.

The “Lótus” and “Tamagnini Barbosa” Luso-Chinese Kindergartens will be closed from 1 September.

The Education and Youth Affairs Bureau (DSEJ) said that low birth rates and weak demands mean that the closure is necessary, after assessing the situation of the public schools network.

Affected students and members of staff will be transferred to the Infants section of the Tamagnini Barbosa Luso-Chinese Primary School and other Luso-Chinese schools.

The well-known Constitutional Law expert, Gomes Canotilho, Professor of the Faculty of Law of the University of Coimbra, Portugal, will be the speaker at the Seminar on “The Constitutional Process of the EU: The New Constitutionalism –The European Constitution as a Problem” which will begin from today (27 June).

Included in the Co-operation Programme in the Legal Field between the European Union and Macau, the seminar is taking place daily, until the end of the week.

The first part of the seminar, which is under the title of “Three items: three problems”, will discuss the topics “Constitutionalism as a multilevel constitutionalism”, “The new constitutionalism and the demands for a good governance” and “The new constitutionalism and the network of legal orders”.

The second part of the seminar will be entitled “Constitutionalism and the weaknesses of Constitutions: the European debate” and will discuss the topics “Constitutionalism and migrations”, “Constitutionalism and economic dislocations”, “Constitutionalism and multiple citizenships”, “Constitutionalism and social models”, “Constitutionalism and the policies of security and national defence” and “Constitutionalism and universalisation of principles”.

The seminar is organised by the Legal and Judicial Training Centre and will be conducted in Portuguese. The seminar targets Law degree holders and is already counting on the attendance of around forty participants.

The Co-operation Programme in the Legal Field between the European Union and Macau, which incorporates this seminar, has as its main objective the “Consolidation of the Macau Legal System” and is already in its fourth and last year, taking place until February 2006.

The total budget for the programme is of 1,980,000 euros, shared in equal parts by the European Union and Macau.

The co-ordination of the Co-operation Programme is at the responsibility of the International Law Office, being the organisation of the pertaining activities ensured by several other entities of the Macau Government, namely the Legal and Judicial Training Centre, the Legal Affairs Bureau, the Economic Services and the Institute of European Studies, other than the International Law Office itself.