Parliament this Friday in plenary confirmed the decision of the Committee on Transparency and Statute of Deputies to refuse to lift the BE leader’s parliamentary immunity, in a vote marked by a protest from Chega in the chamber.
Socialist Isabel Moreira’s advice was approved with votes against Chega and for all other benches and deputies.
After voting on the Opinion of the Transparency Committee, all of Chega’s members stood up, waving posters with a picture of Catarina Martins and the word “impunity” underneath, as they banged the tables.
“I consider the gesture we are now witnessing to be highly offensive and unacceptable in a democratic parliament,” said then President of the Assembly of the Republic, Augusto Santos Silva, receiving general applause from the remaining benches of the chamber.
At the end of the vote, the only PAN deputy, Inês Sousa Real, stressed that she agreed with the opinion on Catarina Martins, but recalled that parliament had already waived her immunity to respond to an alleged defamation lawsuit that was initiated by veterinarian Joaquim Grave, about bullfighting. .
“I have offended absolutely no one and this Assembly of the Republic, with the exception of the PSD, has decided to waive my immunity. I am not afraid to go to court to defend my ideas, which I cannot accept is a precedent. There are no substitutes for first and second. We are all equal in our rights and duties,” he said.
This intervention prompted the socialist Pedro Delgado Alves to request the dissemination of the two opinions in question, to which the parliamentary leader of the BE asked to add a third on Mariana Mortágua and to which Ventura added the request on all opinions on the members of Chega, who says immunities have already been lifted even for participating in televised debates.
Shortly before the start of the voting, the deputy and leader of Chega, André Ventura, had lodged a complaint against the inclusion of this opinion on the agenda, which was rejected by the Speaker of the Parliament, after he subsequently submitted an appeal that also rejected on all benches in the House, with the exception of his party.
Ventura wanted the vote taken off the agenda “because of a flagrant violation of the Constitution and the Rules of Procedure” which the council “must guarantee”, he said in a lofty tone, leading the speaker of the parliament, Santos Silva, to shoot : “must raise the voice I hear”.
Subsequently, the parliamentary leader of the BE, Pedro Filipe Soares, stepped in to emphasize that “Deputy Catarina Martins, as is her prerogative, has never said that she did not intend or refused to have her immunity waived”.
Pedro Delgado Alves, from the PS, stressed that Article 27 of the Statute of Deputies stipulates “that when a Member has a special interest in a matter, he must declare it in advance before speaking in plenary”.
“And this issue is not irrelevant. Because the complainant of the criminal complaint against Ms. Catarina Martins are the 12 members of Chega,” he said, accusing Ventura of using “a criminal process with political and partisan purposes”, in an intervention that had been applauded by communists and blockists.
For the PSD, Emília Cerqueira recalled the case of the lifting of the parliamentary immunity of the only member of the PAN, recalling that she had voted against this advice.
“Because we understand that even if we strongly disagree with what the statements in the political struggle are, we have the right to say them. And it is this defense of the institution, of the Assembly of the Republic and of democracy who, when it comes to the political opinion and the political struggle, even if we are in absolute confrontation with her, we think she has the right to say that,” he stressed.
Chega wanted the deputy to be heard and formed an argument in the context of a complaint filed by her bank accusing the BE leader of libel over statements made on the night of the last parliamentary election a year ago.
At the time, referring to Chega, Catarina Martins said that “any racist deputy elected to the Portuguese parliament is another racist deputy”.
The opinion’s conclusions stated that these statements “were made in the context of a confrontation between political parties, so that the waiver of parliamentary immunity could restrict the free exercise of Ms Catarina Martins’ parliamentary mandate”.
The document also states that this case falls within the cases where the waiver of immunity is not mandatory and that the BE Coordinator has ruled in favor of non waiver.
Source: DN
