Macau, China, 29 Sept – Around 500 civil servants took part in a protest Sunday against the Macau government, organised by the Macau Civil Servants Union, known as ATFPM (Associacao dos Trabalhadores da Funcao Publica).
The protestors were demanding salary rises, regulations on contracts and re-hiring two teachers, whose contracts were not renewed.
Macau has around 20,000 active state workers.
The protestors, whose march finished near the Macau government headquarters, had their faces covered with surgical masks, wore t-shirts and black hats and shouted in Chinese, demanding better working conditions.
During their march, the protestors stopped in front of the Education and Youth Affairs Bureau, demanding that Sou Chio Fai resign from his post as the director of the bureau “for not renewing the contract of two teachers”.
Jose Pereira Coutinho, president of ATFPM, which has 8,000 members, said that there were no more workers in the protest because “our campaign for the protest was made difficult as a result of an attack by hackers on our website”.
ATFPM believes that 1,000 people took part in the protest, though police authorities say that the number was 400.
(MacauNews)
