The president of the republic, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, on Friday called for new “inspiring leaders” in the face of “the great change” in the world, warning that the repetition of past formulas could be useful many times over. but in others “it doesn’t open the future”.
“I feel that what is happening in the world is a major geopolitical, economic, social, scientific and technological change and it is normal for the younger generations to play a greater role in this change,” Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa told journalists after his intervention at the opening of the 8th edition of the Estoril Conferences, which will take place at Nova SBE’s Carcavelos Campus.
According to the President of the Republic, “new heroes at all levels” are needed, noting that “heroes only come from new ideas and new leadership, from this change”.
“That’s inevitable. By the way, I said I’m speaking to myself because I really feel that the repetition of formulas from the past is often helpful, at other times it doesn’t open up the future,” he stressed.
Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa made it clear that he is speaking specifically about the Portuguese reality, pointing out that “the solutions that appear at the international level are often more of the same”.
“There are certain leaders, some for decades, decades, and then what seems like an alternative for the future are the same leaders for another four, five years,” he said.
Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa said that European political systems are “still very hostile to this change” and “this leads to the emergence of new forces, new movements that embody the idea of change.”
“On a universal level, if we see the kind of change in big countries, in big powers it is very small and this is also happening in institutions of a different nature and I think there will inevitably be a cost going forward,” he noted on.
The call of the President of the Republic is “for changes of ideas, but they require leadership that is inspiring”.
“The world has changed and the answer to the crucial question is only one: we need inspiring leaders, not just doers. Some of those doers may be inspiring, but most of them are no longer,” he had said in his speech at the opening of the event, which took place in English.
When asked if this change should apply to his successor in the Palace of Belém, Marcelo made it clear that his intervention “has nothing to do with the election a, b, c, d”.
“It has to do with the role of young people in political systems being bigger or smaller, it has to do with the role of women being bigger or smaller or still very low in some topics, the role of migrants which are greater or lesser or near zero in political systems. There are certain hundreds of thousands of people, or more than that, who exist, live their lives and don’t count against the system,” he lamented.
The head of state was also questioned about the news brought to the fore by The Observer that the Prime Minister, António Costa, spoke at the Council of State on July 21 about equating party searches with those of lawyers and clarifying the finance law.
“The prime minister starts with a short intervention, but there the prime minister has just spoken in parliament that day on the same subject and then closes because he listens to the different interventions and if he wants to do it, he usually wants to. intervenes,” he explained.
Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa refused to tell what happened at the Council of State and again referred that at this last meeting the Prime Minister had not taken the opportunity to comment on what he had heard “because more had passed before his departure than planned.”.
“[O Conselho de Estado] it’s one of the instances of the last eight years where, barring one point or another, it can be said that what’s going on there has generally not gone away. That’s good, I think it’s a good system because it never left the president’s audience with the prime minister,” he replied when asked how he saw the fact that information about what happens in the Council of State is made public.
Source: DN
