António Costa responded on Monday for the first time to the case of the Minister of Infrastructure, João Galamba, and his now former deputy, Frederico Pinheiro, namely regarding the intervention of the SIS in the recovery of the computer that the latter had removed from the premises of the ministry.
For the prime minister, João Galamba gave “the warning of the theft of the computer containing classified documents” to the Information and Security Service, which sent an agent to Frederico Pinheiro’s house to recover the computer, the observer said. which the Prime Minister’s office asked.
But he insisted Costa’s office, the Head of Government “was not and did not need to be informed”, “nor did he take any steps” at the General Secretariat of the Information Service of the Portuguese Republic regarding the appeal to the SIS on this matter.
For Costa, “the authorities acted accordingly within the scope of their legal powers”.
However, according to the law, the Prime Minister has direct supervision of the SIS. This service, in turn, has no police powers and may only be called in in cases where national security is at stake.
It is recalled that the question of the legitimacy of the involvement of the SIS in this situation was raised on the night of the incident by the Liberal Initiative, which questioned the Prime Minister, who remained silent on the matter up to now.
Source: DN
