PSD deputy Hugo Carneiro has filed a criminal complaint against three directors of the Political Accounts and Financing Entity (ECFP) to challenge a complaint filed by this body with the Public Prosecutor’s Office regarding financial irregularities in the organization of the “Europe Festival”, organized in 2018 by the European People’s Party (EPP), of which the Social Democrats are part. The deputy, who was then deputy secretary-general with financial responsibility, is named as responsible in the lawsuit.
Following this process, the Assembly of the Republic yesterday approved the lifting of Hugo Carneiro’s parliamentary immunity, according to the opinion of the Commission for Transparency and the Statute of Deputies, which was decided last Tuesday. “For my part, the Commission for Transparency and the Statute of Deputies has informed me to comment on this matter,” confirmed the Social Democratic delegate of DN, adding that “it is also normal for this to happen to deputies when there situations like these. even when it comes to going to court as a witness. It’s the same,” he clarified. “I said I would love it if they raised it [a imunidade parlamentar] and I made myself available for full cooperation with the judiciary”emphasized Hugo Carneiro, claiming, however, that “this is all nonsense that has no end.”
Faced with the complaint filed by the ECFP with the Public Prosecutor’s Office, which he considers “defamatory” and “slanderous”, the PSD parliamentarian guarantees that he looks forward to “getting all the questions they need to ask”. “The entity’s complaint is that they believe that” holding the “Festival of Europe” is a cost of the PSD “and not of the PPE parliamentary group”, Hugo Carneiro explained. “But this is absurd. If we didn’t participate in the organization, we wouldn’t be heard and we wouldn’t figure out how this could be our thing,” he wondered.
PSD members Paulo Rangel and José Manuel Fernandes also asked the European Parliament to lift their parliamentary immunity, claiming it was “in the interest of the organizers to fully clarify the ECFP’s weakly substantiated and false questions” . According to the two PSD delegates, the ‘Festival of Europe’ fell within the framework of the political activities of their respective constituency and was paid for ‘with the available resources of the European Parliament, with scrupulous respect for the strict rules of the European Union’ . Parliament and whose use has been duly authorized by the competent European entity and already scrutinized by the European Parliament”.
“I have a clear conscience. There are precedents, there are situations where the Transparency Commission has not approved the investigation. In my case I said that I agreed with that.”he concluded.
Source: DN
