Stop summoning Galamba to parliament ‘urgently’ to explain TAP privatization

Chega will summon Infrastructure Minister João Galamba to parliament “as a matter of urgency” to explain the government’s admitted possibility of a 51% to 85% privatization of TAP, the party leader said this Friday.

“The government still doesn’t know who they will be, or don’t have in mind who the international organizations interested in buying TAP are, and we don’t know what model we will have in TAP if we are going to have 51% privatization. 80%, 70%, we don’t know. And we need to know,” Andre Ventura said.

President Chegui spoke in Funchal, on the sidelines of the conference to nominate the head of the party list in the legislative elections of Madeira, commenting on the news published this Friday by the Jornal Económico that the socialist executive is studying the sale of 51% to 85% of the Portuguese airline .

“Therefore, today we are going to call Minister Joao Galamba to the emergency parliament to explain two very simple things: how the TAP privatization process is going, who are the stakeholders, who are the entities that are really interested in buying TAP and is it true that Iberia, the Spanish reference company is part of this stakeholder group,” he explained.

Andre Ventura said that Chega “has nothing against the Spaniards” or against any partner country of the European Union, but warned that “any Portuguese understands that this is not in the strategic interests of TAP and the Portuguese economy, that TAP is in hands. Spaniards of Iberia, because they are naturally inclined to prefer the “node” of Madrid in relation to Lisbon.

“This is a clear strategic mistake that Chega will strongly oppose,” he said.

Andre Ventura, on the other hand, stressed that “it’s not the same thing to privatize 51% and 85%”, stressing that Chega wants to know “how much we will get for privatization compared to the 3.2 billion we spend already in the process of nationalization.

“We have a minister [João Galamba] completely fragile, completely aloof and unable to give these answers, ”he lamented.

Chega’s chairman said it was important to secure “a number of strategic directions” in terms of business preconditions, including securing regular links with the Autonomous Regions of Madeira and the Azores.

“If we were in government, in a coalition or not, we would demand exactly this. impose a number of conditions on the company, if it is legally possible and if the courts confirm it,” he said.

Even on the sidelines of Chega’s list leader’s presentation in Madeira’s legislative elections, Andre Ventura expressed the party’s “full solidarity” with the nurses’ strike taking place nationally, saying his fight was “very fair”.

“It is curious that today we also see two parliamentary parties – the Left Bloc and the PKP – close and in solidarity with this nurses’ strike – which we also welcome – but which for six years approved the budgets of the Socialist Party, which most influenced the lives of nurses”, he said, then amplified: “It took six years to get approved budgets that would have mattered. They didn’t, and now they stand in solidarity with the nurses. This is a lot of hypocrisy. together.”