“He is very comfortable and even likes it, enjoyed it,” he stated in an interview following the elections on the 14th, adding that his list, New Hope, “is coordinating” a meeting with government elements of Macau “to discuss and further professional relations with these entities”.
“I have always kept an equidistant stance to play the role of a deputy in overseeing governmental action, but I think so,” he added as a caveat.
The number of votes for Pereira Coutinho’s list has been consistently rising since 2005, and this year nearly doubled in percentage terms compared to numbers four years ago.
New Hope, backed by the Macau Public Administration Workers Association (ATFPM, of which Coutinho has been president since 1998), secured 43,367 votes (26.73% of the direct votes counted), compared to 18,232 votes (13.8%) four years ago, allowing the election of three deputies to the local parliament.
The Association of United Citizens, the second most voted list, traditionally the strongest and supported by the Fujian community linked to businessman Chan Meng Kam, lagged by 13,903 votes, almost nine percentage points behind the victorious list, yet still managed to elect three deputies.
The remaining four lists each elected two deputies, making a total of 14 elected directly, alongside 12 through indirect election and seven deputies to be appointed by the chief executive, who will assume roles in the VIII Legislative Assembly starting October 16th.
“This is a miracle. Being Portuguese, speaking Chinese, being accepted, and overthrowing all competitors is something that remains in Macau’s history,” he remarked.
On whether the result was influenced by the government’s strong campaign led by Sam Hou Fai urging voting from civil servants, who form the electoral base of New Hope accounting for nearly ten percent of registered voters, Pereira Coutinho stated “it has nothing to do with the chief executive”.
The deputy emphasized, alternatively, the importance of the voting facilitation offered this year to public employees, such as flexible schedules and free transportation provided on the 14th.
Coutinho acknowledged that his list’s success was surprising but attributed it to the strength of social media, the merit of his program, and efforts directed towards a special electorate, the 68,600 workers from the six gaming concessionaires in Macau.
“I have a photo with 127,000 ‘likes’ on my Facebook, 127,000. And from there I started thinking: ‘we might have salvation, a lifeline, which is social media’,” he exemplified.
The campaign instilled a new urgency in Pereira Coutinho’s list: “we are now investing in hiring more social media staff to edit pieces and interventions in the Legislative Assembly,” he announced.
Besides social media, José Pereira Coutinho associated another factor contributing to victory: he believes that the work done over the years with gaming concessionaire workers also yielded important results.
“We had many votes [from workers] from the six gaming concessionaires. Because people do not know what we have been doing in recent years,” he said.
“Did you know that during the last typhoon, casino workers were trapped, without rest, for 30 hours, without overtime, without being able to go home? So, don’t they have families? All this added up, it is clear they had to vote for us because we showed work,” he considered.
The outcome achieved a week ago imposes “a huge responsibility”, admitted the deputy. “Even today I was thinking, how are we going to maintain the 43,000 votes,” he confessed.
“It will indeed be a sadness if we can’t deliver. […] The campaign period [for the 2029 elections] started today. Today. Today we have to start working for four years from now. And that’s how we achieve these results,” he stated.
However, he also admitted, “it is not going to be easy”. “Satisfying 43,000 people, maintaining high society support indices demands more and more, and millions of services have to be provided to citizens, and this is at the top of our priorities.”
