The president of the republic reaffirmed on Friday that Pedro Passos Coelho is “a political asset for the future” and justifies saying out loud what “many Portuguese are asking for”.
“I said to say this: the country owes you something because it really owes you what it did during the troika crisis and what a political asset it is for the future. I have said this to many people, it is my opinion as President of the Portuguese Republic, say out loud what many Portuguese think”said Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa today in Vila Nova de Gaia, Porto, on the sidelines of a meeting of magistrates.
Faced with news in the weekly Expresso this Friday that the praise he made had not been well received by the former prime minister, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa said he was speaking as a president and not as a citizen.
“With regard to Doctor Passos Coelho, as with many other people in Portuguese life, I spoke as the President of the Republic, I did not speak as Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa,” he insisted.
On October 15, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa ruled in Amarante that the country “still has to expect a lot from the contribution” of former Prime Minister Pedro Passos Coelho, at a time marked by his statements about sexual abuse cases in the Catholic Church.
“Being so young [Pedro Passos Coelho]the country can expect must expect a lot from its contribution in the future, I have no doubts about that,” he told journalists, noting that the “resistance” of the former head of government during the period of the Troika came from within and without is recognized in Portugal.
“The country, in a very difficult period of crisis in the Troika, owes to Prime Minister Passos Coelho a resistance, which I could only hear two days ago praised through the mouth of the then Chancellor Angela Merkel. That is why it is recognized within and recognized out there, it’s a fact,” added Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa.
The statements of the President of the Republic took place on the sidelines of the ceremony that marked the beginning of the centenary commemorations of Agustina Bessa Luís, who attended the former Prime Minister.
Source: DN
