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At 11:58 a.m. on December 20, 1999, the last Portuguese flag on Macao soil was slowly lowered amid the sound of the Portuguese national anthem, announcing the end of Macao's old era.
At 0:00 that night, the national anthem of the People's Republic of China was played loudly, and the bright five-star red flag slowly rose, as hot as a flame, igniting the hearts of countless people present.
Countless applause and cheers spread like waves in the crowd, and people rushed to tell each other about this day when the people of the whole country celebrated together, and at the same time announced to the world that Macao has returned to the embrace of the motherland.
At noon the next day, another line dressed in PLA uniforms walked into Macao's territory with neat and imposing steps, accompanied by endless applause and cheers at each place.
People know that this is the army stationed in Australia sent by the motherland, and it is a shield used to protect their personal safety, which also gives the Macao people a stronger sense of belonging to the motherland.
In fact, the stationing of the Macao military is not as logical as people imagine, and it has experienced countless negotiations between China and Portugal and various thoughts of the mainland on this matter.
It is worth mentioning that when the mainland was hesitant about the garrison, Ma Mankei, a wealthy Macao businessman, took the initiative to find the Xinhua News Agency's branch in Macao at that time after hearing about this, and he was very excited to indicate: There must be a garrison!
After Ma Wanqi's strong recommendation was conveyed to the central government, the central government immediately began to carefully discuss and study the garrison, and replied to Ma Wanqi: Don't worry!
Who is Ma Man Kei? Why is there such a strong attitude towards the garrison?
Ma Wanqi's first half of his life was full of twists and turns
Ma Wanqi was born in 1919 in a wealthy family in Nan'an Village, Nanhai County, Guangdong Province, for which Ma Wanqi has received a good education since then, and his academic performance has always been among the best.
However, changes always happen when they are caught off guard, and when Ma Wanqi was in the second year of junior high school at Nanhai Middle School in Guangzhou, his father died of illness.
The Ma family, who had lost their pillars, had no choice but to give up the idea of continuing to study and learn the technology of making a living instead.
He first went to Mihang as an apprentice, and he was very down-to-earth and tireless in doing things, which made many customers trust him very much, and soon, he accumulated the first capital and contacts for entrepreneurship, and Ma Man Kei began to plan the relevant matters of entrepreneurship.
Soon, he found that Shanghai's sugar industry has a very good room for development, coupled with the abundance of sugar cane in the Guangzhou area, which is very suitable for the development of sugar industry.
He soon bought a batch of machines, hired workers, and opened his own sugar factory in the Pearl River Delta region.
Ma Wanqi's sugar factory business is not to say that it is booming, there is a steady upward momentum, just when he thought he could seize the opportunity to make a career, the change came unexpectedly.
At that time, it was 1938, the Japanese invaders' actions were becoming more and more rampant, and they had extended their claws to the Guangdong region, and on October 21, Guangzhou completely fell, and all the lives were destroyed.
Seeing this, Ma Wanqi knew that Guangzhou could not stay any longer, so he had to pack his bags, close the sugar factory, and take his family to Hong Kong for refuge.
Ma Man Kei was not idle during his time in Hong Kong, but began to start his own business non-stop.
With his excellent ability and rich experience, he made several Hong Kong businessmen willing to cooperate with him, so with Ma Man Kei's efforts, he started a grain and oil import business and opened several shops.
Just when everyone thought that Ma Wanqi would finally be able to stop and rest, he felt that a crisis was approaching.
Sure enough, the iron feet of the Japanese invaders stepped on the land of Hong Kong to trample wantonly, and although Hong Kong did not completely fall at this time, Ma Man Kei saw through the situation and began to secretly go to Macao to find another way to live.
In December 1941, Hong Kong had completely fallen, and Ma Mankei's business in Hong Kong had suffered a heavy blow, but fortunately it had moved to Macau.
Due to the reservations of his contacts and financial strength, Ma Man Kei soon found his own place in Macau's business world.
Perhaps it was the repeated relocation and the infinite sadness of being far away from his homeland, Ma Wanqi realized early on that only when the motherland is truly strong can the people truly live a happy life.
Coincidentally, during Ma Wanqi's treatment of lung disease, he became friends with his treating doctor, Ke Lin, who himself was an excellent Communist Party member with rich underground work experience.
During the time he spent talking with Ke Lin, Ma Wanqi gradually gained a deep understanding of the Chinese Communist Party, and the two coincided on many points of view.
Although Ma Wanqi was not a member of the CCP at this time, his progressive ideas were also very in line with the talent requirements needed by the CCP at that time.
So Ke Lin introduced it to his other party members, and gradually, Ma Wanqi also recognized a circle with communists as the main body.
Ma Man Kei during the Macau period
During his stay in Macau, Ma Man Kei gradually changed from an initial business celebrity to a well-known celebrity in Macau, and his influence gradually expanded to the point that he was well known to the people.
It turned out that when Ma Man Kei fled from Hong Kong with his family to Macau, he wanted to return to the mainland for a while, but during this time in Macau, he saw some scenes, which made him decide to stay in Macao.
According to Ma Man Kei in a later interview, he saw the streets of Macao full of displaced, hungry and cold compatriots, looking at these refugees displaced by the war, Ma Man Kei wanted to do something.
So he chose to stay and did what he thought he should do: provide food to refugees and transform Kiang Wu Hospital into a charity hospital.
At the same time, he also took great risks to deliver batches of supplies to inland soldiers who were fighting hard.
After these things were done, Ma Man Kei bluntly said that "since this time, he has formed a very deep relationship with Macao." Not only did the people praise Ma Man Kei unstoppably, but Ma Man Kei himself fell deeply in love with Macau in the process.
At the same time, as Ma Mankei's business in Macau grew, Ma Mankei even established his Macau business kingdom and became richer. While his career is thriving, Ma Man Kei has not forgotten to do some practical things for the people of Macao.
In 1948, Ma Man Kei joined the Macau General Chamber of Commerce and became vice president, which at that time was mainly an association that led Macau compatriots and rulers to fight for their own interests.
Ma Man Kei was very concerned about this matter, worked conscientiously for 33 years, and won many due rights and interests for Macao compatriots.
In November 1949, China Airlines and China Central Airlines were engaged in an uprising in Hong Kong, leaving behind a batch of precision aviation and radar-related equipment after successfully going to the newly established People's Government.
After Ma Wanqi learned that the Kuomintang government was sending people to find out the whereabouts of this batch of equipment, he immediately asked people to find this batch of equipment and transported it back to the central government overnight.
If it were not for Ma Wanqi's vigilance and loyalty, one can imagine how much this batch of equipment would have helped the already defeated Kuomintang government.
In 1952, violent clashes between Portuguese soldiers stationed in the border gate area and mainland soldiers led to serious protests and a decision to close the gate.
This means that the access between Macau and the inland area has been blocked, which has caused great unrest in Macau's urban area.
At that time, Ma Man Kei was invited by the Macao government to negotiate with our government, and he and Ho Yin traveled back and forth between the mainland and Macao many times.
They risked their lives to fight for the relevant interests of the Macao people again and again in negotiations when transportation was not convenient at that time. It can be said that the satisfactory settlement of the "closing gate" incident is inseparable from Ma Wanqi.
Not only that, after the founding of New China, Ma Wanqi still insisted on helping the liberation of the whole territory of New China, and during the liberation of the whole territory of Guangdong, Ma Wanqi often took risks to transport batches of military materials to help the PLA liberate Guangdong.
Time has passed, Ma Wanqi has never changed his patriotic heart and always insisted on doing what he can do, how precious it is.
Macau returns to the motherland
On 13 April 1987, China and Portugal signed the Sino-Portuguese Joint Declaration at the Great Hall of the People, announcing that Macao would officially return to the embrace of the motherland in 1999. In other words, there are still more than ten years left for the central government to prepare for Macao's return.
At that time, Ma Man Kei had already become a "red man" of the central government in Macao, and was not only received by the party and the central government many times, but also participated in important visits and other activities several times.
At the same time, he also served as the deputy director of the Drafting Committee of the Basic Law of the Macao Special Administrative Region in 1988, and it can be said that his influence in Macao at that time was not small.
Ma Man Kei was thrilled to learn that Macau would soon be returned to the motherland. To this end, during his tenure as deputy director, in order to bring Macao and the mainland closer together, he personally participated in the preparation of the bill, and even often worked day and night.
But at that time, there was an even more difficult matter, which was the issue of Portuguese and Chinese troops after the return of Macau.
Since the social order in Macao was not stable at that time, many people hoped that the emerging people's government could arrange a garrison to escort the army, which was also the demand made by China and Portugal during the negotiations at that time.
However, the Portuguese government chose to withdraw its troops at this time, believing that the Portuguese side had been stationed in Macao for many years, so correspondingly, the Chinese side could not station troops in Macao.
The inability to station troops means that the territorial integrity of the country cannot be guaranteed, and this request put forward by Portugal can be said to be quite arrogant and unreasonable, but the central government did not refuse it at the first time.
It turned out that because the People's Republic of China was still not established for a long time at that time, although it already had the confidence to negotiate with the Portuguese government, considering that Portugal had been in power in Macao for many years after all, many forces were mixed.
As the mainland's influence in Macao is relatively small, if it strongly refuses at this time, it is not difficult to imagine that the Portuguese side will take advantage of this to endanger the safety of people's lives and property, which is also the first thing that our government thinks of when negotiating.
As a result, the central authorities fell into discussions on this matter for a period of time, but they were unable to discuss a satisfactory result.
At this time, after Ma Wanqi learned that it was appropriate to garrison the military, he immediately reflected with the person in charge of the Xinhua News Agency's Macao branch, and his attitude was very firm, and he said bluntly: "We must garrison troops, otherwise the sovereignty of the country cannot be guaranteed!" ”。
At the same time, the person in charge was asked to transmit his statement back to the center. After the central authorities learned of this, they had an in-depth conversation with Ma Wanqi on this matter, and Ma Wanqi gave his opinion.
He bluntly said that if Macao does not have a Chinese garrison, not only will the people's lives and safety not be guaranteed, but it will also cause a lot of remarks in the world, thinking that the mainland chose to abandon the garrison out of cowardice, and the influence of this matter cannot be underestimated!
And because Ma Man Kei himself has lived in Macao for many years and has a certain influence, the central government gave a very clear answer after listening to his opinion: "Don't worry, we will definitely garrison troops!" ”
In the midst of endless negotiations, finally, in mid-June 1999, the Portuguese side and the Chinese Government reached a unanimous agreement on the stationing of troops, agreeing that the Chinese side would send appropriate and sophisticated troops to Macao.
This also comes to the opening scene. In fact, it is precisely because of the troops stationed in Macao that the public order in Macao is getting better and better, and the people's lives are becoming more and more stable instead of being badly affected.
It can be said that Ma Wanqi's "suggestions" were very forward-looking.
On December 20, 1999, when he saw that Macao had finally returned to the motherland, Ma Man Kei said with tears in his eyes: "I am very happy that the people are finally in charge of their own affairs." ”
Ma Wanqi is also very keen on donating to public welfare, no matter where the country is in difficulty, he is always willing to help and give his part.
He is willing to donate generously to anything that is beneficial to the country's development, including the Science and Technology Innovation Fund, the Teacher Award Fund, donations to the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, and countless schools and hospitals.
In Ma Wanqi's own words: "People always have to do something useful to society in this life, so as not to walk in this world in vain." ”
The mountains are on their backs, and the scenery stops. Throughout his life, Ma Wanqi has always held a firm deficit heart and always insisted on doing what he thinks is right.
Ye Xuanping, executive vice chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, once praised him: "He is a consistent patriot and a close old friend of the Communist Party of China." ”
In this regard, what do you think, welcome to leave a message in the comment area to discuss.