The political week was marked by (once again) an incident between André Ventura – and by extension the Chega bank – and Augusto Santos Silva, President of the Assembly of the Republic. The reason: the non-direct condemnation of the second highest figure in the state of the alleged attacks suffered by some deputies of André Ventura’s party during last Saturday’s (October 30) housing demonstration.
On Monday, André Ventura called the journalists and in addition to announcing that he will report to the Public Prosecutor’s Office about the “serious crimes” committed against the deputies, he took the opportunity to leave criticism of Augusto Santos Silva: “One last word for Augusto Santos Silva. He used his social networks to criticize and condemn anything and everything. When some deputies are attacked and insulted, his deputies, he remains silent like the coward he is. If he is a coward, he has no place as President of the Assembly of the Republic.” The answer was not long in coming and the next day, Augusto Santos Silva in the plenary – after being questioned by André Ventura – classified the accusations as an “artificial speech” and called on Chega deputies to refrain from issuing “provocations”, initiatives “with motivations very far removed” from yours. And he also accused Ventura of to be a coward: “As for the expression Mr. Deputy used to pamper me yesterday: [segunda-feira] at a press conference and did not have the courage to repeat it here, I just want to tell you that Your Excellency should always keep in mind that when you see me, you do not see yourself in the mirror.” Ventura responds and says that he acknowledges Santos Silva not as president, nor of Chega’s bank, and leaves the plenary in protest.
In an opinion article in the newspaper sunrise Published on Friday, Chega’s leader accused the parliament speaker and former foreign minister of being “the biggest villain” of what he called “a brothel of villainy”: the Third Republic.
But the clash between Ventura, Chega and Augusto Santos Silva is not new. Already at the beginning of the parliamentary term, in April 2022, the leader of Chega intervened in the plenary, with an insulting speech towards the Gypsy community due to the alleged involvement of one of its members in the death of PSP agent Fábio Guerra. Augusto Santos Silva then interrupted Ventura, saying that “there are no collective guilt accusations in Portugal.” Since then, several pennants have been exchanged between the two sides.
Besides Ventura, other deputies, such as Diogo Pacheco de Amorim or Pedro Frazão, had disagreements with the (effective or acting) president of the parliament.
‘Chega managed to differentiate the attacks’
Looking at these cases, Riccardo Marchi, professor and researcher at ISCTE-IUL, does not believe that these conflicts damage the image of democratic institutions. “How much damage they do to the image of the person who holds the position and who shows that he is unable to break free from his party membership to play the role that falls under his responsibility,” he told DN. In other words, it is not the figure of the President of the General Assembly that is affected, but rather the person (in this case Santos Silva). “Not only the voters of Chega, but also of the centre-right, convinced that these clashes are a socialist party strategy to isolate Chega, that is: an instrumentalization of an institutional position that must be independent”, he analyzes.
However, these attacks from both parties are not limited to the mandate of Augusto Santos Silva. If you rewind the tape, you can see that the coexistence with Chega (at the time with only André Ventura as sole deputy) was anything but peaceful during the presidency of Eduardo Ferro Rodrigues (in the previous legislature). Just a month after the General Assembly’s inauguration (in December 2019), Ferro Rodrigues said that Ventura “used too easily the words disgrace and disgrace, which often offends this Parliament and offends you too”. In response, Ventura said he used the expressions he understood in the name of “freedom of speech.”
For Riccardo Marchi, this fact shows that “Chega managed to differentiate his attacks against those occupying the position and thus protect the institution [Parlamento]which, by the way, is never disputed. The complicated relationship does not have to do with the presidency of the parliament, but with the cordon sanitary policy set up by the socialists towards Chega in all the institutional positions they occupy,” the professor believes.
April 25 episode was not “disrespect for the institution”
After a few pecks here and there, the wars between Chega and Santos Silva escalated on April 25 of this year. In this case, during the solemn session welcoming Lula da Silva, in which Chega vehemently protested the Brazilian president’s presence in the plenary. Irritated by the protest – which was based on banging on tables and raising posters in protest – Santos Silva took the floor in a harsher tone, saying: “Delegates who want to remain in the plenary must behave politely and courteously. and education required of every representative of the Portuguese people. Enough! Enough insults! Enough humiliating settings! Enough to disgrace the name of Portugal!’
This episode, says Riccardo Marchi, represented yet another “disrespect for that left-wing politician than for the institution of the Assembly of the Republic. Care was even taken to ensure that the ceremony was not interrupted”. This, he says, “is no coincidence. It is strategic, even to be nothing more than subversives of the institutions, but rather radical opponents of certain leftists.”
Possible applications at Belém facilitated
Despite the role he plays, Santos Silva is seen as a possible candidate for president in the next elections, in 2026. And for now, nothing rules out that Ventura does not also participate in the race – especially since he already did so in 2021, when he came third.
But according to Riccardo Marchi, none of the candidacies will be affected by this. On the contrary. According to the ISCTE researcher, if they are candidates, this even “makes their campaign easier compared to the other candidates.” Why? “Because it polarizes the confrontation between the defender of the system against the ‘barbarians’ and the savior of the democratic regime against the owners of the system who took it away from the people. The polarization of the two roles will draw the attention of the media, away from the others, who will present themselves with the usual speech of the ‘president of all Portuguese’.
Source: DN
