The Invisible Constitution in Comparative Perspective

particularly the guarantee of the right to demonstrate in art. 27, to hold that 

where the ordinary law had imposed a restriction on the minimum number of 

persons that could exercise this right, such a law would be inconsistent with 

the MBL and not applicable and that priority should be given to an interpreta-

tion of that ordinary law that could achieve consistency with the MBL.

81

77 

Ibid.

, 9 (即法院不能以此判斷而作出某規範違法的具普遍約束力的判決，有關判斷只在

本身案件中有效，對其他案件，以至其他法院均不產生任何效力，被認為違法的規範

也不會因此而失效。

)

78 

Ibid.

, 9–10. See also TUI Case No 21/2007 (14 May 2008).

79 

See, for example Jorge Miranda, Manual de Direcito Constitutcional 2nd edn vol. 6 (Coimbra: 

Coimbra Editora 2005); and Jose Manuel Santos Botelho, Contentcioso Administrativo 4th edn 

(Coimbra: Almedina 2002).

80 

See TUI Case No 5/2010 (12 May 2010) 34 (在對法律規範之合法性的監控範疇，以《基本

法》規定為標準，重要的是要考慮，不是由相關機構本身對法律解決辦法作出

‘正面’的判

斷：或者說這樣判斷，監控機構猶如立法者

(及‘替代’它)那樣，從分析評估狀況開始，然

後以它自己的想法作為法律解決辦法的合理性標準去確定具體個案中的解決辦法為

‘合理

的

’、‘公正的’或‘理想的’。合憲性監控機構不能走得那麼遠：他們應做的僅僅是一種‘消極

性

’判斷，即排除那些從各點上看都不能列為合乎情理的法律解決辦法。).

81 

See TUI Case No 2/2011 (12 January 2011) 5–6 (where the TUI referred to a 2007 annotation of 

the Portuguese Constitution by the jurists Gomes Canotilho and Vital Moreira on the nature 

of the rights of assembly and demonstration).

---

 

The Constitutional Orders of ‘One Country, Two Systems’ 

253

The TUI finally encountered the first right of abode case in 2014, which 

concerned the application by an Irish national for permanent resident sta-

tus on the ground that he had ordinarily resided in Macau for a continuous 

period of seven years immediately before the making of the application and 

had taken Macau as his place of permanent residence. The TUI affirmed the 

TSI’s judgment in favour of the applicant on the meaning of the requirement 

in art. 24(5) of the MBL of ‘having taken Macau as his place of permanent 

residence’ (as it was implemented in MSAR legislation), after consulting both 

Mainland Chinese and Macanese texts, as well as the text of the Portuguese 

jurist Joao de Castro Mendes on the concept of ‘domicile’. It held that the 

Bureau of Identity Establishment’s rejection of the applicant’s application was 

contrary not only to the relevant MSAR legislation, but also to the said provi-

sion of the MSAR.

82

 In the same year, the TUI dealt with a case of a Chinese 

national claiming to be a permanent resident of the MSAR under art. 24(2) of 

the MSAR, namely, a Chinese national who has ordinarily resided in Macau 

continuously for seven years before the establishment of the MSAR. The court 

referred to the law previously in force before the establishment of the MSAR 

to determine whether the claimant had ordinarily resided in Macau continu-

ously for seven years by that time.

83

This series of cases and the legal reasoning in them would have been 

of little surprise to Vitalino Canas, who wrote in early 2007 that while the 

Macanese courts before the 1999 handover may conduct judicial review of 

constitutionality, be it on their own after 1990 or by way of an appeal to the 

Constitutional Court (Tribunal Constitucional) of Portugal at Lisbon, ‘in the 

context of the Basic Law, there can be no judicial review of the constitutional-

ity by a Constitutional Court. But we may consider whether the MSAR ordi-

nary courts can, under the BLM, Article 143 and 11, second paragraph, refuse 

the application of rules in conflict with the same BLM’.

84

 It also appears to 

the present authors that anyone who has read art. 41 of the Estatuto Organico 

de Macau would also find the TUI’s exposition of the above constitutional 

principles unsurprising.

85

 Yet, such judicial examinations have had effect only 

82 

See TUI Case No 21/2014 (7 January 2015).

83 

See TUI Case No 115/2014 (28 January 2015). The TUI relied on the principle in art. 11 of the 

Macau Civil Code (Código Civil) on the temporal application of laws.

84 

See Canas, Vitalino, ‘The General Regime of Fundamental Rights in the Basic Law and the 

International Instruments’ in Jorge  Oliveira and Paulo  Cardinal (eds.), One Country, Two