The Environment Minister said on Monday that the government will reflect on the issues on which decisions are justified, arguing that priority should be given to issues relating to community funds, permits and payments.
“The government will of course carry out a reflection, which will be carried out by the entire government and not necessarily by the Ministry of the Environment, on the matters that justify taking decisions during the management period and on the matters that should wait for the establishment of a new government,” the government official said.
Duarte Cordeiro spoke to journalists in Parliament, after a joint hearing in the Budget and Finance and Environment and Energy committees in the context of the 2024 state budget (specialty).
“The principle that seems elementary to me, despite the fact that this issue needs to be discussed within the government, is that we must pay attention to matters related to public funds that cannot be lost, matters related to licenses that may expire and some matters that we will consider which are relevant, because they interfere with other entities that are beneficiaries,” the Minister explained, giving as an example the financing of teams of forest firefighters.
Also asked about his involvement in the case under investigation and which led to the Prime Minister’s resignation last week, Duarte Cordeiro reaffirmed that he had a clear conscience and recalled that he is not a defendant in the case nor does he think that he will be. If so, he said, he would speak to the Prime Minister immediately.
Regarding today’s statement from the Central Criminal Court, the minister said that nothing changes in this regard, and in his answers to journalists he said that lunches or dinners do not mean that there is “no position to defend the public interest ”. .
“We are calm about the decisions we make in the exercise of our functions,” he said.
How calm they are, he added, regarding the process in which he contacted the company Start Campus, as he contacted others so that they could participate in the competition regarding the capacity of the electricity grid in Sines.
“It was important that everyone participated” to manage the network and to have an idea of the future predictability of all network needs, he said, concluding: “There is nothing abnormal about this procedure, there is nothing suspicious and we are available to explain”.
During the all-night hearing, Duarte Cordeiro said that the president of the Portuguese Environment Agency, Nuno Lacasta, had already asked the defendant to leave his post by the end of the year.
Portugal will hold snap parliamentary elections on March 10, 2024, scheduled by the president of the republic, following the Prime Minister’s resignation on Tuesday.
António Costa is the target of an investigation by the Public Prosecution Service at the Supreme Court, after suspects in a case linked to matters involving lithium, green hydrogen and a data center in Sines invoked his name as having intervened to unblock proceedings.
Source: DN
