The president of the republic on Thursday expressed hope that the delay in implementation of the Recovery and Resilience Plan (PRR) “will be rectified throughout 2023”, after announcing that 15 investments are in a worrying or critical condition.
During a press conference at the Belém Palace in Lisbon, with the President of Hungary Katalin Novák – who is on a state visit to Portugal – Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa commented on the information from the National Monitoring Commission (CNA-PRR) on Wednesday that there were 15 investments are in a worrisome or critical condition.
The head of state recalled that he has been following “with attention and concern” the pace of implementation of the PRR and stressed that there are “two phases” in its application.
The first, according to the President of the Republic, has been implemented “without delay” by the government and consists “in relations with the European Union, requesting funding that has been granted and allocating this funding to intermediary entities in the implementation process”.
“The second phase, in which there have been delays, is the transfer of funds from these intermediate entities to the final beneficiaries: opening of tenders, procurement decisions, start of implementation, execution of the works and therefore payment to the final beneficiaries as the implementation of the works is completed,” he stressed.
Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa said it was precisely in this second phase that the CNA-PRR recognized that “there is a delay” in the implementation of the funds.
It is “a delay that we all hope will be made up in the course of the year 2023, even before the year 2024. That is why I said in my New Year’s message that 2023 is a decisive year in terms of the PRR implementation calendar”, he stressed.
During this press conference, the Hungarian president was also questioned about the freezing by the European Commission of European funds destined for Hungary, which is accused of violating the rule of law by reversing the rights, freedoms and guarantees of its citizens.
Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa took advantage of the question to point out that Portugal believes that “everything that can be done within the framework of guarantees, within each state, with regard to the fundamental values of the European Union, should be supported, encouraged, encouraged , because it is a cement ” that unites the different Member States.
“We have different views of many realities. We must manage these different views, taking into account the cement that unites us and that cement is made of principles and values that, deep down, are a very important aspect of the union that we and we want – I want, but the President of Hungary also wants – more EU, better EU, a stronger EU, with more future,” he stressed.
On Wednesday, the CNA-PRR identified 15 investments in a worrying or critical state, due to factors such as candidacies delays or overambitious targets.
“We analyzed 69 investments […]33 in line with planning, 21 with necessary follow-up, 13 in a worrying state and two as critical,” said CNA-PRR President Pedro Dominguinhos in Lisbon during the presentation of the monitoring report of the program until 2022 .
Critical states refer to investments by companies, housing, forests and also the digitization of education.
Source: DN
