Madeira News Blog

(31st May). ‘Rodrigo Underwent The Bone Marrow Transplant – The baby is going to spend a few days in recovery in isolation’. The half-hour procedure took place in Lisbon yesterday afternoon, and the first results of the intervention are awaited. He was diagnosed with leukaemia 6 weeks after birth here on Madeira, and after months of searching, a bone marrow donor was eventually found in Germany.

‘Security Worries Estreito de Câmara de Lobos – The population demand the reopening of the police post there’. It is not difficult to hear stories of assaults in Estreito. In each corner there is always someone that has a relative, friend, or neighbour that has been assaulted. With the drug dependency associated with criminality, the feeling of insecurity is a principal problem of the area. The closing of the police post left the population feeling even more vulnerable, and people don’t understand why this measure was taken. The other ‘weak point’ is the health centre. The residents complain that it has insufficient capacity to deal with the number of users. I think Estreito de Câmara de Lobos must be the featured town of the week, but it doesn’t actually say so. Anyway, it should be a long and interesting story to tell after the relative calmness of all the other places visited in this weekly feature.

Ah, in fact there is a second story for Estreito de Câmara de Lobos, this one takes the biggest part of the front page with a picture of a couple of elderly ladies, though the significance of that is not clear. The headline reads : ‘Estreito Of Torment – The assaults and drug trafficking worry’. I ought to explain that an assault means a mugging, or robbery, or assault, or a burglary, but the Portuguese word doesn’t differentiate between those.

Well my secret is now out of the bag, with today’s main news headline : ‘More Supermarkets – The Dutch company SPAR is going to open shortly several units on Madeira’. The biggest food distribution network in the world bets for now on Santa Cruz, Porto Moniz, and Prazeres, but with more shops being planned. The shops are operated on a franchise basis, and so any interested party can open one, as long as they have on average €150,000 to invest. The spokesman for SPAR on Madeira explains that the brand has different characteristics, in that the service is very good, and that special focus is given to fresh fruit, vegetables, fish and meat. Porto Moniz will not have a full fish and meat range because of it’s limited size, but the other two will have everything, including access to a range of 10,000 types of goods, including many ‘own brand’ products. The rest of the article is about the statistics and history of the group. I was told there would be a shop in Funchal as well, but no mention of that. Maybe I will now get that telephone call I have been expecting for the last 3 months, as I was offered a job in the Prazeres SPAR, but it says it won’t be opening for another month or more, so the big blogs continue for now. SPAR WEBSITE

(30th May). ’31 Years In Prison For Two Killers – Court orders payment of €80,000 in compensation  to the child of the victim’. The court of Santa Cruz on Friday sentenced two knife killers, who murdered a 28 year old man in Machico nearly a year ago, to serve sixteen and a half and fourteen and a half years in prison. They were charged with crimes of qualified homicide and possession of a prohibited weapon. The two men attacked the victim from behind in a bar at around 11pm, and according to one witness "killed him like he was an animal", stabbing him six times. The murder was planned at 5 hours before. The main judge had powers to impose a sentence of between 12 and 25 years imprisonment. The court was on high security alert during the trial.

(18th May) The CEO of Zon, one of the two major players in the TV and internet market on Madeira, says that the company is going to change the cable network, and a 100Mbps network “will be operating in the short term”. The new generation network will enable services for video and television in HD (high definition), with much faster transmission speeds for communications and entertainment and services much more advanced. Currently there are 8 channels available in HD, but with the new network this can be increased to 20 or 30 channels. He wouldn’t commit to a date yet, but estimates that news will be available in 2 or 3 weeks. The fixed line telephone service introduced by Zon in 2007 (?) now has 17 thousand customers, with a target to reach 20 thousand by the end of this year. I think most customers get the telephone for nothing, as part of a customer retention offer for the whole package of services, but they will have to do something clever with their prices fairly soon to stop customers moving across to rival MEO.

In a separate article, Zon admits it is still interested in operating the fifth terrestrial channel, despite having already been eliminated at the first hurdle for its failure to meet the conditions to ensure competition in the selection contest.

And sticking with telecommunications, the same CEO of ZON announced that in one to two years it will be possible to video conference through our televisions, combining voice and image in a routine telephone call. The company needs more time to develop the technology, but another factor will be persuading equipment manufacturers to produce the hardware needed at a price that will be attractive to the market.

(19th May). ‘Rodrigo Has Transplant Scheduled For 29th – The procedure will take place in the Portuguese Institute of Oncology in Lisbon. The family expectation increases’. After a long long search for a suitable bone marrow donor, that took baby Rodrigo Sousa almost into his final weeks of life, the medical procedure has now been arranged for a week on Friday. Rodrigo has been undergoing chemotherapy, but has managed to put on weight and now has 5 teeth. The donor, a lady from Germany, was eventually found on an international computer database.

(19th May). ‘Project Costing €3.2 Million In Ponta do Sol Has To Be Rectified – The protective barrier in the sea was inaugurated just a few years ago, but the council say that it was badly done and demands alterations’. The government of Madeira requires the construction, completed in 2004, to be “dismantled”. The corrective work is likely to be more costly than the original project, and will have the aim of restoring quality and allowing more space and depth in this bathing zone. To do so, the beach area would have to be widened, and the stretch of the concrete construction that runs parallel to the beach would have to be moved out further. The article says that it is almost impossible to swim in the existing area, especially when the tide is low. The reasons for why the barrier is as it is at present is not something I can discuss here, but it is well discussed locally (at a rumour level) that there were other options available back in 2003 during the planning stage, and the options chosen for Ponta do Sol, Calheta, Ribeira Brava, and probably others, were possibly not chosen for reasons of ‘best for purpose’, best value, and public approval.

(19th May). ‘Boats Of Sanos In Dry Dock 6 Years Already Lost Revenue Of €100,000’. This story relates to two boats that were brought here from the UK 6 years ago, and for legal reasons were prevented from going to sea. They were purchased for search and rescue missions, and their time spent on dry land is estimated to have been at the cost of €100,000, half of that due to rental space in the dry dock, and a similar amount will be needed for maintenance. The boats were grounded because of problems of certification, but the operator SANAS-Madeira believes they will be put into service around mid-July, subject to a final inspection.

It was unavoidable to notice on RTP news this morning, that the Jornal da Madeira had the headline ‘160 Cases Of False Notes In 4 Month’. Don’t worry I haven’t been sucked into the dark side and actually looked at the government rag, but I thought it best to mention it so you can be on the lookout for any dodgy looking banknotes that may come your way.