Porto Mayor Rui Moreira said this Thursday that the municipality would buy the Stop shopping center if the owners were “able and willing” to sell the property, again rejecting the existence of property rights.
In a video message posted on the social network Instagram, Rui Moreira says that it is “completely untrue” that the reason for the closure of more than a hundred Stop stores, where hundreds of musicians had studios, is real estate interests or the construction of a hotel.
“We don’t know of any real estate projects there,” says the independent mayor.
Rui Moreira also adds that if the owners “could and wanted” to sell the premises, the municipality “would buy the stop or buy the stop, as it did in fact with Teatro Sá da Bandeira”, by proactive action. rights.
“So yes, the hotel was planned and the city mobilized for the Porto City Council to purchase this equipment,” he said, once again dismissing the real estate interests.
On Tuesday, more than a hundred stores in the Stop shopping center were sealed off by the municipal police “due to a lack of operating licenses,” the Porto City Council justified.
Hundreds of musicians occupied the Rua do Heroismo for about five hours in protest, forcing the police to divert vehicular traffic to other arteries in the city.
The Stop shopping center has been operating as a cultural space for over 20 years, and several of its floors are used as rehearsal rooms or studios for various artists.
At a press conference on Wednesday, the mayor of Porto assured that he would not give permission for the construction of “any hotel” on the site of the shopping center and that the purchase of the building by the municipality is not possible.
“I don’t know of any interest in real estate, and I can tell you one thing: the Porto City Council does not allow a hotel to be built there, if that’s the case. (…) The story of what we want is gentrification, which seems like an absurd story to us,” Rui Moreira responded when faced with accusations that alleged real estate interests were at the heart of the store seals.
The Chamber of Porto introduced two options for the movement of musicians, namely the Pires de Lima school and the upper floors of the Silo Auto.