António Costa said Monday that it is “natural” for João Cotrim Figueiredo to leave the leadership of the Libera Initiative (IL) because he believes the party has “decided to compete with Chega in the style of brutality and poor democratic education.” when it intervenes”.
In that sense, taking into account the “strategic option that IL made”, the prime minister said he understood the option announced Sunday. “I realize that João Cotrim Figueiredo was not comfortable in this style of wrestling in the middle of the mud. I know him well. I admit he is not feeling well,” he analyzed.
On the sidelines of the conference on digital skills at the Instituto Universitário de Lisboa (ISCTE), Costa referred to this approach of IL to the party led by André Ventura, saying he failed to understand why “the democratic right has a real fascination with Chega.” “, to normalize and imitate it.
“They should look to Italy and see what happens. When parties of the democratic right start to normalize the far right, it happens that they are eventually led by the far right,” said António Costa, who joked: “A good future for them and go. continue with this strategy that will go far”.
Costa points to yet another reason for Cotrim Figueiredo’s departure from IL’s leadership after three years, looking at the “extraordinary spectacle” that took place in the UK, with the departure of British Prime Minister, Liz Truss, 44 days after taking office. He characterized a “hyperliberal, liberal initiative style”.
“I realize that those who run the IL feel very embarrassed today with this hands-on demonstration of what the IL would be like to rule,” Costa stressed. He went on to say that in 44 days “two of the great myths that inform these liberal initiatives” were destroyed.
One of them, the prime minister said, is “the fiscal shock” that led to “a tragedy for the pound, for interest rates for the UK’s external credibility and ended in what it is”. “And the other mythology is the construction of a social security system based on people’s savings for private funds, to be rescued after the first disaster with public money injected by the Bank of England,” he said.
“Between the inadequacy of the new style of the IL that Chega wants to imitate in the way of doing politics and what must be the equivalent of what the communists felt about the fall of the Berlin Wall, the fall of Mrs Truss, I understand that João Cotrim Figueiredo will return to his business activities and reflect on how these 44-day liberal revolutions actually end in tragedy.”
The Liberal Initiative announced this Sunday that the party will go to elections in December and that João Cotrim Figueiredo, its current leader, “will no longer be a candidate”. The decision was announced in a statement from the party.
In a communication from João Cotrim Figueiredo to the militants and later published on social media, the now-outgoing leader speaks of a decision that is “personally and politically difficult, but is based on an objective political analysis and is intended to set an example.” his” of his conviction to liberal ideas. “The party needs a more combative, more popular and more inclusive stance at the national level and I understand that I am not the right person to lead this change,” he adds, as “the work of opposition to an absolute majority and the positioning of the different parties implies a different approach than has been followed so far.”
— João Cotrim Figueiredo (@jcf_liberal) October 23, 2022
Despite the resignation of the post, the Liberal Initiative guarantees that “Cotrim Figueiredo will remain available to strengthen the political project of the party in what the new leadership deems useful”. For now, the Liberal leader’s future is not entirely clear.
Source: DN
