Published in the DR opening of the competition for the position of Director General of Health

The announcement of the opening of the competition for the position of Director General of Health was published this Friday in Diário da República, but on the “website” of the Commission for Recruitment and Selection for Public Administration (CReSAP) it is still displayed as “bidding procedure for a shorter open”.

The notice was issued days after the resignation of Deputy Director General of Health Rui Portugal, who replaced the Director General of Health during the holidays, and six months after Graça Freitas publicly announced her intention to step down.

According to the notice, CReSAP “will proceed to open within ten business days of posting on its website the tender procedure (…) for the recruitment and selection of the Director General of Health.” .

Rui Portugal resigned on Wednesday from the position he has held since August 2020, the reasons for his decision are unknown.

In the past few weeks, he has taken on the role of Director General of Health, replacing Graça Freitas, even signing on May 10 a manual on health during childbirth, which was strongly contested by the Order of Physicians.

Despite the fact that Graça Freitas announced in December that she would not remain in this position, the Ministry of Health sent a request to CReSAP to open an open tender only at the beginning of May.

Asked if the Director of Health interrupted her vacation, the DGS response confirmed the information provided on Thursday by the Minister of Health, who said that Director of Health Graça Freitas was “full of his duties.”

A CReSAP source told Lusa that the order came in on May 3rd.

The health minister said in April that a decision on who would replace Graça Freitas as head of the DGS would be made by the middle of the year to prevent interruption of functions.

On Thursday, in response to a question about Rui Portugal’s resignation, the health minister insisted that the DGS was performing “full functions” and that a tender for a new health director general should be open “in the coming days”.

In an interview with Público newspaper in February, Rui Portugal, deputy director general of health, expressed his willingness to apply to CReeSAP.

“I have a curriculum, local, regional, national and international experience that allows me (…) I think I can make a very significant contribution to both the speech and the agenda,” he said.

Despite the announcement of the opening of the tender in a notice published today in Diário da República on the CReSAP website at 10:30 am, it still appeared as “a tender procedure that will open soon.”