The President of the Republic dedramatizes the political situation in Madeira

This Monday, the President of the Republic dedramatized the political situation in Madeira, saying that he understood the option of “waiting a few days”, since “the idea is to create” the conditions for the formation of a government.

“No [não estou preocupado]if the idea is to create the conditions for the formation of a government, a government program that can pass through the regional parliament and pave the way for a regional budget, if that is what is at stake, I understand the representative of the republic when he understands. Let’s wait a few days and see if these conditions exist that are important for Madeira,” said Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa.

In Porto, in connection with the presentation of the facsimile edition of the travel notebook of Soares dos Reis, the head of state recalled that the representative of the Republic in the Madeira archipelago has the “right” to wait to find out whether or not there will be conditions for the approval of the government program of Miguel Albuquerque by the Regional Legislative Assembly.

“What is happening now is very simple: the representative of the republic agreed to the idea, which in fact was his authority, of the president of the regional government, who had to abandon the negotiation program with additional negotiations with political parties to achieve the opportunity to pass through the regional administrative assembly,” – he explained.

And he continued: “These conversations, these negotiations continue, and the representative of the Republic must wait, and in the end he will be told whether they were successful or not, and in the end he moves forward with what only he has. power is the power to form a government.”

According to Marcelo Rebelo de Souza, “the representative of the Republic is following the process, and the problem that arises there, that has arisen in the Azores and has also arisen at the national level, is that it is preferable to have a viable program than not to have one.” one program has become viable, it is better to have a budget than not to have one.”

On Wednesday, the head of the regional government of Madeira, Social Democrat Miguel Albuquerque, announced that the government program would be withdrawn from debate in the Madeira parliament, with a vote scheduled for the next day, Thursday.

The document, which is voted on in the form of a vote of confidence, will be rejected because PS, JPP and Chega, with a total of 24 deputies out of the 47 that make up the semi-circle, have announced their vote against.

Today, the representative of the Republic of Madeira said that he will never be able to eliminate the political consequences of the non-approval of the Regional Government Program, stressing that the executive branch “sits exclusively” in the Legislative Assembly and only this body can dismiss him. .

In early regional elections on May 26, the SDP elected 19 deputies, giving it five terms to achieve an absolute majority (which requires 24), the PS received 11, the AKP nine, Chega four and SDS-PP two. , and IL and PAN elected one deputy each.

After the elections, the PSD signed a parliamentary agreement with the Christian Democrats, but still lacked an absolute majority. Both parties have a total of 21 seats.

Also after the vote, the PS and JPP (20 seats in total) announced an agreement to try to remove the PSD from power, but the representative of the Republic realized that this was not viable and nominated Miguel Albuquerque.

The May elections took place eight months after Madeira’s legislative elections on September 24, 2023, after the President of the Republic, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, dissolved the Madeira Parliament following a political crisis that arose in January when Miguel Albuquerque was named as a defendant. in a case of alleged corruption.