The Madeira government program today begins to be discussed in the Legislative Assembly under threat of leadership after the PS, Chega and JPP announced their vote against the document of the executive led by Social Democrat Miguel Albuquerque.
The debate on the regional government program, which is due to begin at 9:00 am in the Madeira Legislative Assembly in Funchal, in the form of a vote of confidence, will last three days and end on Thursday with a vote on the Executive document, which took office two weeks ago, on June 6, after early elections on May 26.
In these elections, the SDP elected 19 deputies and has five terms left before achieving an absolute majority. The PS elected 11 parliamentarians, the JPP nine, Chegu four and the SDS-NP two, while the IL and PND elected one MP each. After the vote, the PSD signed a parliamentary agreement with the Christian Democrats, but it still lacks an absolute majority – both parties have a total of 21 seats, and 24 are needed if the already announced votes against the PS, Cega and AKP are confirmed. The regional government’s program will be rejected.
According to the regulations of the Legislative Assembly of Madeira, government debates cannot exceed three days and begin with the intervention of the President of the Executive, with debate time distributed among parliamentary groups and individual deputies according to their representation.
The debate will end on Thursday with “intervention by an MP from each party in the reverse order” of the introduction, and will be closed by the leader of the executive.
“After the completion of the debate, the vote on the vote of confidence in the government program will take place at the same meeting,” the regulations say.
Since the Political-Administrative Statute of Madeira is silent on the consequences of rejecting a vote of confidence, what the Constitution of the Portuguese Republic stipulates in Article 195 regarding the dismissal of the executive must prevail. According to paragraph e) of the article, “failure to approve a vote of confidence” is one of the reasons leading to the resignation of the government.
In other words, the rejection of the government program will ultimately lead to the fall of the government led by Miguel Albuquerque, who will still remain at the helm, since, despite taking office on June 6, the executive power will only come into force after the document is approved.
In this scenario, the representative of the Republic in the region, Ireneu Barreto, will once again listen to the parties represented in Parliament and try to find a viable government solution.
If Miguel Albuquerque realizes that he can resubmit the Program, he will have to do so before July 6, since the Charter defines “a maximum period of 30 days from the inauguration of the President of the Regional Government.”
Alternatively, another name may be nominated for the post of executive president, as requested by some parties with seats in parliament. Over the weekend, Chega once again expressed his willingness to promote a social democratic executive with a different leader.
If the formation of a new government proves unviable at all, Chief Executive Miguel Albuquerque will continue to govern the country until early regional legislative elections are held, which could only take place from the end of January 2025, subject to constitutional deadlines.
Last month’s vote also came eight months after Madeira’s legislative assemblies met on September 24, 2023, after the President of the Republic, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, dissolved the Madeira Parliament following a political crisis triggered in January when Miguel Albuquerque was accused in the alleged corruption and eventually resigned.
In a mandate that began in 2023 and is expected to last until 2027, Miguel Albuquerque, head of the executive branch since 2015, managed to get the government program approved with a positive vote from the PSD, CDS-PP (with which he had a coalition ) and PAN (with which he had an agreement on parliamentary protection), as well as voting against all opposition. In the subsequent political crisis, the 2024 budget was not voted on.
Author: Lusa
Source: CM Jornal
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