Macau’s former top prosecutor linked to over 2,000 corrupt construction projects

Ho Chio-meng, the former top Macau prosecutor arrested on Friday while trying to leave the city, was linked to a corruption racket involving more than 2,000 construction projects that benefited “many” local businesspeople, the city’s anti-corruption chief said on Sunday.

Without naming names, Andre Cheong Weng-chon, head of the Commission Against Corruption, confirmed “a former prosecutor-general”, along with his assistant and consultant, were arrested over questionable public works contracts worth 162 million patacas, of which 44 million patacas was pocketed as kickbacks through “complex and indirect networks”.

Ho, 60, led the prosecutions office for 15 years before vacating the post two years ago.

Cheong said he had notified Chief Executive Dr Fernando Chui Sai-on about the case during the investigation “out of the statutory requirement” but said Chui gave him no instructions on how to proceed.

Ho was once regarded as a possible candidate to challenge Chui’s re-election bid in 2014. He did not run eventually.

His corruption case was first reported by the prosecutions office to the commission in the first half of last year. Initial investigations showed that Ho granted almost all 2,000 construction and renovation works related to the public prosecution office between 2004 and 2014 to 10 companies controlled by local businessmen, two of whom are relatives of a leader of the prosecution office, according to Cheong.

“He granted the contracts to companies that did not actually undertake the projects,” Cheong said. “Although there were tenders sometimes, it was in fact a facade among a number of businesspeople.”