A group of local racehorse owners wants the Macau Jockey Club (MJC) to apologise to residents for the abrupt collapse of racing in the city, the Macau Daily Times reports.
In a letter addressed to the MJC’s senior officials and the Gaming Inspection and Coordination Bureau, the owners said the call to terminate horse racing in Macao failed to take into account “the feelings of residents and the interests of all horse owners.”
The government announced in January that it was terminating the club’s contract, giving stakeholders very little time to wind down their operations before the MJC’s last full day of operations on 31 March.
The letter claimed that racing’s demise would do more than remove an exciting weekly fixture from the local calendar. It said ending horse racing would also likely prevent Macao from hosting equestrian events in the 15th National Games, which are set to take place next year and are jointly hosted by Macao, Hong Kong, and Guangdong province.
[See more: Could a theme park take the place of Macao’s soon-to-be defunct racetrack?]
The letter noted, too, that a mid-season termination would tarnish Macao’s image in the eyes of the Asian Racing Federation, a 28-member regional regulator for the sport. The 2023-24 racing season kicked off last September and had been scheduled to run until August.
The owners also complained that they and other stakeholders were not consulted about the impact of the club’s closure and again denounced the club’s compensation offers as inadequate.
Macao’s racehorse owners have maintained that the MJC repeatedly dispelled rumours the club’s financial difficulties were serious enough to jeopardise racing’s future, with some owners claiming that the MJC urged them to invest in new horses on the premise that racing would continue.
The closure of the SAR’s sole horse racing concessionaire, after 40 years of operation, spells the end for a once thriving sport in Macao, with the government stating that it won’t be offering any further racing tenders.
