On 1st January 2016, the existing Macao Sport Development Board changed its name into Sports Bureau, for the purpose of effectively meeting the standards of the sports field nowadays and setting up a sports department “tailored” for local sports circle. Meanwhile, its structure has been reformed and expanded by increasing the number of departments from two to five and divisions from seven to eleven, including handing over the work of the Macao Grand Prix Committee to the newly established Macao Grand Prix and Major Sporting Events Department, and putting an additional Athlete Training and Development Department for highly competitive sports and training issues. According to the Then President José Tavares of Sports Bureau, there will be many challenges in the future, yet the new functions will be able to bring new opportunities and the new structure will enable more professional performances in every field.
Increase of Three Departments and Four Divisions
Replacing the old name Macao Sport Development Board by Sports Bureau, the working structure is reformed on the original basis. The new structure maintains one President and two Vice Presidents with five Departments including: the existing Sports Development Department and Sports Facilities Management Department, and the additional Macau Grand Prix and Major Sporting Events Department, Athlete Training and Development Centre and Organization, Administration and Finance Department.
Towards a More Professional Structure
The Then President Tavares commented on the restructure of Sports Bureau and new arrangement of functions that, “The reason why we changed the name into ‘Sports Bureau’ is simple, which is to let people understand our work in a more direct way. The most obvious change with the new functions and structure is that, the previous functions, along with the work for sports events taken over from the Civic and Municipal Affairs Bureau and the Grand Prix, are further split and given to three additional departments to reduce the heavy workload the Sports Development Department used to shoulder. The work in each sphere will be more professional as well.”
Key Echelons Building
To be in tune with the policy objectives of the SAR Government, Athlete Training and Development Centre is established. The Then President Tavares stressed that “The major function of the Center is to build athlete echelons, develop training scheme for highly competitive sports and organize participation in competitions and training. For the moment, the Center is not yet completed, yet the software has to be in place even prior to the arrival of hardware, as training and echelons building cannot be done overnight. Despite the temporary vacancy of the positions of Center Director and Head of Center Management Division, the Athlete Training Division is already functioning and its work will continue.”
Taking over Responsibility to Organize the Grand Prix
Another attention-catching reform is the Macao Grand Prix and Major Sporting Events Department led by the former Head of the Sports Development Department Lam Lin Kio. It is responsible for the organization, implementation and awareness-raising of the Grand Prix and major sports events.The Then President Tavares pointed out, “I am confident that Lam Lin Kio is capable of taking on the task. In addition, with the support of the team of more than 20 people having been following up on relevant work and the experienced technical colleagues from the Sports Bureau, we can do better for sure.”
Pun Weng Kun promoted to President of Sports Bureau
Pun Weng Kun, Vice President of the Sports Bureau, was promoted to President on 1st March. On 16th March, the duties of Vice President was taken over by Lam Lin Kio, Department Head of the Sports Bureau. Meanwhile, Lei Si Leng became the Head of the Macau Grand Prix and Major Sporting Events Department.
