It was a well-considered choice, prepared and with a lot of input. There is no shortage of senior officers within the PSP with a proven track record of reaching the top, but the Home Secretary intends to make a solid paradigm shift in the main security force for public order in cities. The chosen one, José Barros Correia, aged 58, met the requirements that José Luís Carneiro considers most relevant and that also sensitized Prime Minister António Costa, who approved the preference.

He will now take office on September 4, as will the new general commander of the GNR who, like the DN had already moved up, will be Rui Ribeiro Veloso, the first general of the Garde’s career to reach the top, making it the marks the end of the military era in leading this security force.

Labeled on the PSP as a “security guard” and a “muscular” police force that has always been linked to Magina da Silva – the man who wanted armored vehicles to patrol the neighborhoods of sensitive urban areas and who was one of the most brilliant gunmen in the Grupo de Special Operations (GOE), which he commanded for many years, must now be exchanged for that of ‘civilist’ for Barros Correia and for a PSP more ‘close’ to the civilians. It should be recalled that in 2005 the new National Director initiated and coordinated the Proximity Police pilot project at the PSP, which he prepared and coordinated.

But this transformation will require a profound rethinking of the PSP, starting with a reorganization of the police stations in Greater Lisbon, which has been promised since at least 2012 and never materialized.

José Luís Carneiro has someone in Barros Correia who can help him not to make the same mistakes of the days of the “supersquadrons” of Dias Loureiro, in 1991, because, when he was deputy commissioner, he stood out in the famous “law brigades”. of the “super team” of Olivais, with interventions in high-risk areas, such as Curraleira and Cambodia.
The minister will be pleased to know that with this new national director there will be no television in police operations in sensitive urban areas, because not only the use of force is the last rule, but above all because communities should not be punished for a minority of criminals.

Barros Correia and José Luís Carneiro also agree on the evidence that the population will only accept the closure of police stations if they actually see more police on the streets. Preferably on foot, in contact with the locals, listening to their problems, gaining confidence and benefiting from the wealth of information they collect.

Police from every pore

“Transparent, honest and a cop from every pore,” says a former officer who has known him since joining the PSP.

If ‘frontality’ was a quality of Magina da Silva valued by José Luís Carneiro, this will be a characteristic he should be able to count on in Barros Correia as well.
Perhaps that’s why he has the originality of not receiving any awards since he was promoted to Superintendent, which says a lot about his ability to be frontal and say what he thinks without pleasing or worrying about his superiors.
Before knowing the name of the new national director, Paulo Jorge Santos, president of the PSP Professionals Union Association (ASPP), the most representative union structure, said of the profile he preferred: “Someone who knows the PSP well is sensitive to the issues that concern her and the professionals and are not politically subservient”. If Barros Correia doesn’t fit in, few will.

He is respected in the trade union environment and has always defended dialogue with these structures. He was one of the founders of the Association of Police Training Officers, which became the National Union of Police Officers, after serving as its president.
Not many PSP commanders motivate undersigned agents and statements of support from union leaders when they are removed from office and the official justification of “resource management” is not convincing. That is exactly what happened when I was in command of the Lisbon traffic division.

Despite the fact that the then leader of the Lisbon Metropolitan Command (COMETLIS), Monteiro Lopes, said of the young subintendent Barros Correia that he was “capable of” carrying out all the tasks “assigned” to him, that he had his “maximum confidence on a personal and professional level” and that he would “manage another branch of the PSP”, this did not convince the agents, who were promoting a petition, nor the unions. Manuel Morais, then Vice President of the Southern Region of the ASPP, credited Barros with the removal. Corresponds to his rigorous conduct as commander of the Traffic Division: “This commander imposed a rule in traffic that all drivers must be treated equally and what his subordinates tell me is that this removal only benefits the predators of the elites” , was charged against Lusa.

Operational across the board

As an only child, he was born in Mozambique, where he came after April 25. On his return he lived in Favaios, where his parents were born, but later they moved to Lisbon. The father was an employee of the judicial police, in administrative departments, the mother was also an official.

He entered the Military Academy, but much to his father’s chagrin, he didn’t like it and the following year enrolled in engineering and at the Higher Police College. He chose the latter career and made his debut in 1984 with the first group of PSP officers. His comrades included Magina da Silva, Constantino Ramos (current Number Two), Paulo Lucas (current Commander of the Special Police Unit). the past few years, before the PSP.
Barros Correia holds a degree in police science and a postgraduate degree in international relations from the Higher Institute of Social and Political Sciences.

At PSP he had clean and hard operational functions, such as in the aforementioned Olivais brigades, but he also commanded major divisions in Lisbon and at COMETLIS itself, where he headed the Operations and Security Department.

In 2005, when he was promoted to Superintendent, he took over coordinating the PSP’s Integrated Proximity Policing Pilot Project – which began in Greater Lisbon police stations, with a focus on Amadora, where rapprochement with immigrant and descendant communities was sought. That year, on February 17, PSP agent Irineu Diniz, 33, was killed near Cova da Moura, shot 22 times by drug dealers.

Between 2008 and 2014, he was regional commander of the Azores, from where, without landing in Lisbon, he then became liaison officer in S. Tomé en Principe. When he returned after three years, a standoff badly managed by the then national director Luís Farinha forced him on a posting for several months. His name was even spoken to the Lisbon command, but the directorate vetoed it.

A déjà vu and closing a cycle

After almost a year at home (the service commission in S.Tomé ended in May 2014) and in a maneuver that was interpreted as removing him from the power core of the headquarters in Penha de França, he was finally appointed in January 2018 to director of social services at PSP.

A position considered a ‘shelf’ for many, but which Barros Correia managed to streamline to the last moment, significantly increasing the number of accommodations for police officers at the beginning of their careers – with the support of the guardianship. and Finance, three new buildings – and brought services closer to beneficiaries, giving them greater visibility.

When he was called to José Luís Carneiro’s office about two weeks ago, this Chief Inspector felt a little uneasy. déjà vu. He was also there in January 2020 short list of PSP “generals” being called to the office of then minister Eduardo Cabrita to elect the national director. Manuel Magina da Silva turned out to be the option.

He is now moving, as DN reported last June, to Paris, where he will become a liaison officer for the Ministry of the Interior, replacing former director Luís Peça Farinha, who will return to Lisbon to head the Instituto Superior of Police Science and Homeland Security.

It is the end of a cycle at PSP, with a charismatic, unrestrained director who played the leading role in several controversies and who left the police in turmoil. As a senior official told DN a year ago, when a great discomfort about Magina infected the police at the highest level, “The national director isolated himself at the height of his power, stopped listening and accepted different opinions from the police. “I don’t realize how much his leadership is screwing up the PSP. He went into total autism. His general staff doesn’t work, they don’t talk to each other. He’s totally broken the cohesion of the troops, not just between officers and bases.” “, but also between the officers themselves. No one speaks in command meetings because it is not worth it. We have a barrel and gunpowder in the PSP” and it so happens that no one knows how much more is needed “.

Magina’s service commission ended in February this year, but the government decided to extend it to ensure the “stability” needed for what was the country’s most complex security operation, World Youth Day (WYD).

Strengthen cooperation with all police services

De Barros Correia’s agents, chiefs and officers hope that he will once again restore cohesion in the PSP – which will mean a rejuvenation of the commands and national leadership, including officers from the 2nd and 3rd courses – and that the deep knowledge he has of the major problems facing this security force can guide you to their solution or, at the very least, their mitigation.

The lack of staff is distressing, but with a minister who has already said there is no shortage of police, the demand for reorganization of police stations and work will be paramount. Studies have been carried out since the time António Costa was Minister of the Interior that identify the main lines of this path. It’s a matter of updating them.
It will also make a difference – and this was another quality José Luís Carneiro took into account – in the relationship with other security forces and services. Unlike the often confrontational Magina, Barros Correia, at a time when police cooperation is at the top of the government’s agenda – especially underlined by the success of the WYD operation – is valued more for his ability to build and maintain those bridges than for its ability to build and maintain those bridges. are disputes about powers and contradictions. One of the government’s requirements is that there is cooperation with the entire police force and more and more joint operations.

The rejuvenation of the commands will take into account another design that is a big gamble on the executive branch: preparing the new leaders to look more at the best interests of the country, rather than just worrying about their ‘little farm’. .

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