The PS secretary general promised on Tuesday not to waste “one second” on choosing the site of the new Lisbon airport and considered that the right was silent about the size of the rescue operations at SATA.
These positions were outlined by Pedro Nuno Santos at the end of a lunch with the Portuguese Confederation of Tourism (CFP) in Lisbon, following an opening speech by the organization’s president, Francisco Calheiros.
Francisco Callheiros said that Pedro Nuno Santos, as Minister of Infrastructure, “was right” when, in 2022, he published, against the wishes of Prime Minister António Costa, a decree in which, in a first phase, progress was made in the construction of a solution for the airport in Montijo. and then, in the medium to long term, in Alcochete.
The PS Secretary General did not go into detail about the episode, which marked his presence at the Ministry of Infrastructure, but warned that no solution for the future of Lisbon Airport would have majority support and would always be opposed.
“We have an airport with a worn-out runway, we’ve had 50 years of debate with 19 different locations studied. What is Portugal waiting for? I made an attempt, which was unsuccessful, and I am sure that I will not waste a second. , for two reasons: the first is that we really need to start work on the new airport as soon as possible; and the second is symbolic because we need to make it clear that the country must move forward, it cannot be afraid to decide,” he said.
He then referred to one of the topics of the personal meeting he had on Monday evening at the SIC with the president of the Liberal Initiative, Rui Rocha, who criticized the state’s spending on the financial intervention of TAP in the situation of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Pedro Nuno Santos noted that this topic was raised like a “machine gun” by Rui Rocha at the final stage of the debate, when he no longer had time to respond.
In front of tourism businessmen, he once again defended the rescue carried out at TAP, despite admitting that the process “has errors and shortcomings” and that “it is a backpack that you will carry on your back.”
However, he noted that TAP before the pandemic, when it was privately run, was generating losses of 100 million euros a year, in contrast to the fact that the national carrier was saved by an intervention that is now making a profit (200 million in the first nine months of 2023 ), places orders with national companies worth 1.3 billion euros and is responsible for attracting tourists to Portugal, who stay in the country the longest.
But he also made a new argument, complaining that Portuguese politics is sometimes characterized by “inconsistency and dualism.”
The Secretary General of the PS then noted that SATA was also saved, and the size of the intervention of the regional government of the Azores PSD, CDS and PPM, then also supported in the parliament by IL and Chega, corresponded to 10% of the GDP of the autonomous region. ., while in the case of TAR it was about 1.5% of national GDP.
“I am not criticizing government intervention in SATA, but I have never heard anyone criticize this operation. I’ve never heard anyone complain. And to date, there has not been a single year in which SATA has made a profit. But TAP has been profitable since 2022. The difference is that here we are, and in the Azores we are all together,” he said.
Author: Lusa
Source: CM Jornal
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