“25 de Abril is essential and had to be evoked”, says Marcelo

The president recalled that it was the Assembly of the Republic that “authorized the President of the Republic to decree the state of emergency and to renew it twice,” as was the Parliament that approved measures so that Portuguese families and companies could face the difficulties created by the Covid-19 pandemic.

“Yesterday as today, honoring the fundamental role of Parliament, honoring who we represent, honoring this common ground that is the Constitution of the Portuguese Republic that emerged from 1976, honoring the Democracy that we are and all those who made it possible”, declared Ferro Rodrigues.
“Portuguese are vaccinated against austerity”

The president of the AR also left a compliment to all the Portuguese that “against all expectations, against many who thought that this could never happen, the Portuguese were able to overcome blockades and find solutions capable of recovering the country from the deep crisis – even from identity and values ​​- in which he found himself, after a period as difficult and complex as the period of financial assistance was, with profound impacts on poverty and social exclusion “.

“I’m sure of one thing: Portugal and the Portuguese are vaccinated against austerity. It remains to be seen whether the vaccine is 100 percent effective,” he said.

According to the President of the Assembly of the Republic, although the pandemic that Portugal faces “has lost part of what has been achieved with so much effort and sacrifice, it was in Parliament – which also assumed, for this reason, a growing centrality in the functioning of the political system – and in permanent consultation, it was possible to implement a program to recover income and change economic policy, without calling into question Portugal’s international commitments “.

“At a time when the Portuguese expect a sense of responsibility from their representatives, I am sure that all political representatives – because everyone counts, because everyone is important – will contribute to a new present, to a better future,” he added.
“You were born in a free country, but not prosperous”

It was with a letter to the youngest son, who now turns 18, that the sole deputy of the Liberal Initiative spoke for the first time on April 25th. A letter of hope and regret at the same time.

“Thanks to April 25, you were born in a truly free country, but you were not born in a prosperous country”, Said Cotrim Figueiredo. “You should never take freedom for granted. Many had to fight so that you can enjoy it today and you must be prepared to do the same ”, he added.

“The country we left you with has barely grown since you were born 18 years ago. the country we left you with was overtaken by countries that were poorer than we were 18 years ago. The Portugal we left you with is less productive in relative terms today than it was when you were born. Therefore, you and your generation will have fewer opportunities than I had, less choices than I had, less freedoms than I had ”, continued the deputy, in the letter he addressed to his son.

“But don’t despair. It is possible to change by fighting, working, creating. (…) If we change this, the Portuguese will be as good as the best and more free than ever ”.

ENP wants to “flatten the curve” of inequalities

The Greens argued that “the 25th of April is not quarantined”, in a time of Covid-19 pandemic, and that it is necessary to “flatten the curve” of inequalities, 46 years after the “Carnation Revolution”.

“What we hope is that ‘After Goodbye’, that is, after flattening the curve of this pandemic, that we will turn to other flattenings and other curves”, he said, as if “the inequality curve, especially thinking about the thousands of workers who were left without work and those who saw their income reduced with this crisis” or “the treatment curve between banks and taxpayers”.

“It is necessary to flatten the curve of environmental imbalances. It is imperative to flatten the curve of the climate crisis and the loss of biodiversity or the unsustainable use of natural resources,” he added.
Ventura says that “a new regime” is needed

Chega’s sole deputy, André Ventura, defended a new revolution, arguing that Portugal needs “a new dawn” that brings a “new regime” because “this no longer serves”.

Speaking in parliament, the deputy considered that the current regime “no longer serves”, pointing out several criticisms of corruption, taxes, and the way the “professionals in the front line” of combating the covid-19 pandemic are treated.

“And for the enormous respect that we have for those who fought that morning to make a different regime, today we also need a new dawn to bring us a new regime,” he said.

Noting that the founder of the PSD “Francisco Sá Carneiro said that on that day the military carried out a heroic act of liberation from themselves, but succeeded in freeing the whole of Portugal”, André Ventura pointed out that “perhaps the military that morning managed to free themselves from themselves, but failed to liberate the whole of Portugal “.

“That will still be our mission to make it happen,” concluded Ventura.

PAN says “April is yet to fulfill” in the functioning of democracy

The parliamentary leader of the PAN, Inês Sousa Real, considered that “Abril is unfulfilled” in health, in the environment and in the functioning of democratic institutions and defended “a new dawn” with “new policies and a new paradigm”.

“To democracy, ceremonies and other symbologies will serve little or nothing, showing themselves to be unaware of people’s aspirations and concerns, much less of the consequences of the current health, economic, social and environmental crisis, dictated by a silent and unknown disease”, he declared the PAN deputy.

Inês Sousa Real warned that “there are no owners of democracy” and that “only respecting democratic plurality and dissenting voices” is that the “path of increasing populism and demagogy” is blocked.

“April is unfulfilled in the respect that we also owe to animals. In our country, animals continue to be voted for abandonment, mistreatment, deprivation of their freedom or subjection to cruel activities, which violate the humanitarian values ​​that must guide us “, he lamented.

“We need a new dawn. An awakening to a new paradigm”, he defended, proposing “new policies” to reconcile work, family and leisure, new “environmental policies and more empathy and sensitivity towards animals”.

“We don’t accept democracy lessons from anyone”

The parliamentary leader of the CDS-PP stressed that the party does not accept “lessons from democracy from anyone”, thus responding to those who criticized the Christian Democrats for demonstrating against the April 25 celebration model.

“The CDS is one of the four historical parties of our democracy and the representative voice of Christian democracy, in this hemicycle, since the first free elections. We don’t accept democracy lessons from anyone“, said Telmo Correia in his speech.

The parliamentary leader pointed out that the CDS “not only disagreed with this ceremony in a time of pandemic and in a state of emergency” decreed due to Covid-19, “but proposed a viable and responsible alternative” to the formal sitting, through a message from the President of the I republish the country.

For the Christian Democrat, “With this ceremony, in a state of emergency, what the political power is saying is that it allows for itself what it forbade the Portuguese and that it does not respect for itself what it demanded of the people, isolation and confinement”.

“Many will not be able to be with their mothers on May 3 or celebrate their faith on May 13,” he added, arguing that “the whole country owes respect to this parliament, but the parliament must also respect the Portuguese “. Therefore, Telmo Correia considered that “this is a bad example”.

PCP for April, against austerity and exploitation

The PCP’s secretary-general defended the commemorations of the 25th of April in parliament, in times of Covid-19 pandemic, and warned against the speeches of “cuts”, austerity and those who blister “real difficulties”.

Communist deputy Jerónimo de Sousa, wearing a red carnation on his lapel, took advantage of the speech at the solemn session in the Assembly of the Republic to evoke the “April values”, but he also made a series of warnings about the “difficult times” that we live in, rejecting “revenues” such as wage cuts or pensions in the post-pandemic period.

“We cannot accept it,” he said, after saying that “difficult times” are going on.

For the leader of the communists, “it is not inevitable that the epidemic will translate into a regression in the lives of workers and people”, given that the “response to difficulties involves valuing wages and policies aimed at the defense and creation of jobs”.

Jerónimo de Sousa said that celebrating the date of the fall of the dictatorship is also trusting that “the best of its historical path is yet to come and that, sooner or later, the struggle of the workers and the people, the struggle of the Democrats, the will fully materialize “.
BE says pandemic has shown that SNS is “saves and protects”

The Bloco de Esquerda considered that Portugal learned from the pandemic that it is the National Health Service that “saves and protects” people and that health professionals are essential, rejecting the unearthing of the “old booklet” of austerity.

It was precisely the deputy responsible for the health area, Moisés Ferreira, who made the intervention by the blockers – starting with “remembering all the people who succumbed to the new coronavirus” – on an April 25th that he considered to be “different in the way, but even more important in meaning “.

“Today we can confirm that April is the one that fights the epidemic, it is not the epidemic that fights April,” he emphasized.

“We learned that in emergency public health situations it is our SNS – the one that is public, universal, general and free – that saves and protects us. It is not private individuals who make health a commodity, those who closed doors or who saw the epidemic as another business opportunity “, he praised, arguing that a strong SNS” is necessary for the country “.

Rio warns of dangers of new wave

In his speech at the solemn session of the 25th of April, Rui Rio pointed out that, for the first time, this date is celebrated in Portugal “with conditioned freedom”, with repercussions in the ceremony in the Assembly of the Republic, with far fewer people than usual , either from deputies or from guests.

“But what, at first glance, may seem negative, is at bottom a positive example of the democratic regime itself; which, without complexes, proved to be capable of responding with constitutional legality, in the face of a serious threat to our collective health, “he said.

The PSD leader stressed that “Portugal does not have democracy suspended”, on the contrary. “Democracy is very present, by demonstrating that it contains, in itself, functioning mechanisms capable of responding effectively to a unique and absolutely exceptional circumstance,” said Rio, considering that “it would have been dramatic if, due to cowardice or complexes of ideological order “, the state of emergency had not been approved.

Rui Rio warned that if the country is currently experiencing a “very difficult” period from the health point of view, Portugal is not free from a second wave of the pandemic “in a few months”.

“It is therefore necessary for the country to prepare for this eventuality, because the Portuguese economy will not resist a new stop identical to the one we are experiencing”, he defended.

Rui Rio left, therefore, a warning: “The failures that existed the first time cannot be repeated”.

with Lusa

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