On Thursday evening, the prime minister sent a letter to the president of the republic suggesting the establishment of a verification mechanism in the appointment of government officials, an idea he had already discussed in parliament.
This initiative was passed on by a source in the Prime Minister’s office in response to the Lusa bureau on the development of this proposal by António Costa on Thursday afternoon, during the debate on the motion of censure against the government filed by IL.
“The prime minister sent a letter to the president of the republic on Thursday evening proposing a proposal for a verification mechanism to be discussed with the head of state,” a source from the executive leader’s office told Lusa.
In parliament, during the debate on the censure motion of the IL, after being questioned by PAN deputy Inês Sousa Real, the Prime Minister referred to a circuit to “guarantee more transparency and trust from everyone at the time of appointment” of members of the government, as the current system has room for improvement.
On that occasion, he stressed that he would first speak to Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa and then announce what he would propose “so that the circuit can be improved, because it can be improved”.
“I don’t think we can and should normalize abnormal situations, even if they are cases and anecdotes. They have to be taken seriously and, above all, we have to trust that we take them seriously,” he said.
Shortly afterwards, still on Thursday afternoon, the president of the republic defended that any system of vetting potential candidates for government positions should be implemented before the government nominates leaders, not after.
“If there is any intervention, and we’ll see who, how, to identify legality issues, constitutionality issues, or impediments issues regarding who gets appointed to certain positions, as they were called, I think it should be before the government submits the proposal [ao Presidente da República]the head of state told journalists at the Teatro São Luiz in Lisbon.
Source: DN
