António Lobo Vilela (pictured in a file photo), a Macau gaming law specialist – and senior advisor to the city’s Secretary for Economy and Finance, the official who oversees the city’s casino industry – is leaving his post at the end of this year, reported on Friday local English-language media outlets Macau News Agency and the Macau Daily Times.
His departure is voluntary, both media outlets said. Mr Vilela began his current role in 2016, according to the reports.
Mr Vilela had served on the commission in charge of handling the original Macau market liberalisation process at the start of the current century, and the subsequent public tender to grant gaming concessions in Macau in the period 2001 to 2002.
Macau’s six incumbent gaming licensees will see their rights expire in June 2022, and there is due to be a fresh public tender process associated with that expiry.
Amendment of the city’s existing Gaming Law has been included in the list of Macau government business for 2021.
The city’s Chief Executive, Ho Iat Seng, mentioned in the government’s Policy Address for the Fiscal Year 2021, delivered in November at the Legislative Assembly, that the government planned to “improve the legal framework for the gaming industry”, and “start the preparatory work for Macau’s gaming concessions” in the post-June 2022 period.
