The Macau Government Information Bureau (GCS) announced in a statement yesterday that Chief Executive-designate Sam Hou Fai will travel to Beijing today for a three-day visit where he will receive a State Council decree appointing him as the sixth-term chief executive of the Macau Special Administrative Region (MSAR).
The GCS statement did not mention on which day Sam will receive his appointment decree during his three-day visit between today and Saturday.
The State Council appointed Sam on Friday last week as the MSAR’s sixth-term chief executive, whose tenure will start on December 20, 2024 when he will be formally installed, after he was elected Macau’s next chief executive on October 13 when he garnered 394 of the 398 votes cast by the special administrative region’s 400-member Chief Executive Election Committee, or 98.99 percent of the ballots cast, with two electors absent. There were four blank and no invalid votes. Sam was the election’s sole candidate.
The October 13 chief executive election result validated by Macau’s Court of Final Appeal (TUI) was published in the Official Gazette (BO) on Monday last week, confirming Sam as chief executive-elect.
The decision to appoint Sam as the MSAR’s sixth-term chief executive was made during the sixth plenary meeting of the State Council in Beijing, presided over by Premier Li Qiang on Friday last week.
Li also signed Sam’s appointment certificate, officially known as State Council Decree No. 794, on Friday last week, i.e., the one that Sam will receive during his three-day visit to the nation’s capital.
With effect from last Friday’s official appointment by the State Council, Sam is Macau’s chief executive-designate until his swearing-in by one of the top leaders of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) on December 20, coinciding with the 25th Anniversary of the establishment of the MSAR.
Until last Friday’s appointment, Sam, 62, was Macau’s chief executive-elect.
Current Chief Executive Ho Iat Seng, 67, announced in August that for health reasons he was not seeking a second five-year term.
Macau’s chief executives can serve a maximum of two consecutive five-year terms.
Since the establishment of the MSAR on December 20, 1999, Sam had headed the Court of Final Appeal for nearly 25 years until late August when he resigned as the MSAR’s top judge so that he could run for chief executive.
Sam will be the MSAR’s fourth chief executive, after Edmund Ho Hau Wah, Fernando Chui Sai On and Ho Iat Seng. The first two served two terms each.
Sam was born in May 1962 in Zhongshan City, some 40 kilometres north of Macau in Guangdong Province, making him the first Macau chief executive born in the mainland. He graduated from Peking University’s law school, and moved to Macau in 1986 when the city was still under temporary Portuguese administration.
Sam Hou Fai, then chief executive-elect and now chief executive-designate, addresses a press conference at the Forum Macao Complex on October 13 following his election as Macau’s sixth-term and fourth chief executive. – Photo: Tony Wong
