Macao’s last governor under the Portuguese administration has died at age 85, according to an official statement on the President of Portugal’s website.
Vasco Joaquim Rocha Vieira was a military man and politician who served as the 138th governor of Macao between April 1991 and 19 December 1999, the day before its handover to China.
Rocha Vieira died in Portugal on Wednesday after a prolonged hospital stay resulting from a fall, sources familiar with his situation confirmed. The presidential statement described him as “one of the most distinguished officers of the Portuguese Army” and close friend to President António Ramalho Eanes (who led the country from 1976 to 1986).
It also referenced his time in Macao, noting that Rocha Vieira’s involvement in the territory’s transfer to China “will remain in the memory of many Portuguese people as an example of a sense of state, a sense of service to the public cause and marked patriotism.”
[See more: Portugal’s last governor says Lisbon has “a privileged knowledge” of China thanks to Macao]
In the statement, Portugal’s current president, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, offered Rocha Vieira’s widow and children “Portugal’s gratitude, with much fond friendship.”
Rocha Vieira was born in 1939 in Lagoa (Algarve), Portugal. He embarked on a military career and served as a general of the Portuguese army, being appointed chief of the Army General Staff in 1976. His first taste of service in Macao occurred slightly before that from 1973 to 1974, Portuguese media reported.
Rocha Vieira served as Minister of the [Portuguese] Republic for the Azores between 1986 and 1991, the same year he became Macao’s governor. He was chancellor of Portugal’s Council of Ancient Military Orders between 2006 and 2016.
The former governor visited Macao in 2023, when he received an honorary doctorate from the Macau University of Science and Technology. While in the SAR, he noted the history of Macao had given Portugal “a privileged knowledge” of China – a country he described as “a superpower in the making”.
