Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa assured this Friday, leaving the Palace of Belém, that he maintained the position he took in communications with the country when he defended that the Minister of Infrastructure, João Galamba, could not continue after the TAP- crisis.
“I maintain exactly what I said 15 days ago. I have told the Portuguese my point of view and I maintain it today. I follow everything that happens and will only speak if I understand it. I understand that I must not speak now. And the the Presidency’s sole spokesperson is me”he assumed in a brief statement, following Galamba’s hearing at TAP’s Parliamentary Investigation Committee (CPI).
On May 4, after Prime Minister António Costa rejected João Galamba’s resignation request, Marcelo assumed “a fundamental difference of opinion with the Prime Minister” in the Galamba case and a “fundamental difference” on the “question of the political and administrative responsibility of who is in charge”, he assured that he would be “more attentive and intervene daily” to prevent “the appearance and increase of unstoppable and undesirable factors”. Still, he made it clear that he would not cause a political crisis, taking into account the country’s economic and social problems.
At the time, there was no doubt about the divergence to keep João Galamba in the position of Infrastructure Minister, as evidenced by several issues he raised in his speech:
“How can a minister not be responsible for an employee he chose to keep in his closest team, in his office, to oversee, even if it is for information purposes in a file as sensitive as TAP’s where the Portuguese have already invested in millions of euros, and does he deserve so much confidence that he can attend private meetings and prepare other meetings, these public ones, in the Assembly of the Republic?”
“How can this minister not be responsible for scandalous, very bizarre, intolerable or deplorable situations – the words are not mine – raised by this employee, leading to an appeal to the most sensitive services for the protection of the national security. [o SIS]who, by the way, are in the service of the state and not of governments?”
“How can this minister not be responsible for arguing publicly about what his subordinate had said, revealing details of the inner workings, including references to other members of the government?”
Marcelo justified not resorting to dissolution as it would “add problems to the problems that the Portuguese already have at the moment”, and also because “the Portuguese are refraining from these surprises, these stops, these waiting times, at a time like this”, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa promised “to signal more intensely during these more than two and a half years everything that could remove the Portuguese from the government”.
And he identified “weaknesses” of the government causing “a greater deterioration” in the life of the country, what he wants is “that the rulers solve their day-to-day problems, the prices of food, the functioning of schools, the speed of justice , the price of the purchase of housing”.
Source: DN
