Katarina Martins accuses prime minister of ‘deafening’ silence on TAP cases

The Bloco de Esquerda coordinator criticized this Sunday the prime minister’s “deafening silence” on TAP-related issues, stressing that any minister “can’t even be shielded” in the explanation.

Silence of the Prime Minister [António Costa] about the problems TAP is deafening and hard to explain. At the moment, the prime minister can no longer rely on any minister’s explanation, as no explanation from a minister is worth it. In addition, a minister says one thing, while another minister says the opposite,” said Katarina Martins.

“This is really the moment when the prime minister should start giving explanations to the country in the ‘dossier’ that I think we are shocked and that the whole country is shocked by the incompetence, irresponsibility and frivolity that has been treated with a strategic company for Portugal, and this means millions of euros for the country,” he added.

The bloc coordinator spoke to reporters at a conference at BE’s national headquarters in Lisbon to announce that the party will present a draft resolution in parliament on Monday to protect revenues in the face of inflation and abandon the stability program. 2023/27 submitted by the government on the 17th of this month.

“We believe that the government’s plan for the country leads to the impoverishment of the population and does not protect public services in Portugal,” said Catarina Martins.

Asked about the words of the President of the Republic, in which Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa defended that there could be good and bad news in connection with the possible dissolution of the government, Katharina Martins said that despite the fact that she is “neither a commentator nor a decoder of the Head of State, the fact is that there is an executive body “involved in many serious matters.”

“We have cases where ministers give conflicting versions in parliament in millions of euros ‘dossiers’ such as TAP, in which the prime minister, in the end, cannot explain who is right if it is the minister Mariana Vieira da Silva, whether it is Minister Ana Catarina Méndez who says that there are legal opinions that are not shown, or it is the Minister of Finance who says that these opinions do not even exist,” Block de Esquerda, coordinator, said.

For Katarina Martins, this is “just one of many cases” noting that the public cause “is not treated in the way that democracy and republican ethics require”, which has caused instability in the country, exacerbated by problems in education, health care, security forces and justice.

“We cannot continue to have schools with a shortage of classes. Now there are many students without classes, and not because of the strikes. This is because public schools are short of 30,000 teachers. […] And with the presented Stability Program, none of this will be resolved, there is no reserve,” he stressed, defending himself in the same respect with regard to the healthcare sector.

“We have emergencies to close at Health and we have a kind of map that you can walk on every day because you never know which door will be open or closed in the emergency room. […] With a stability program that [o Governo] represents, there will be no opportunity to solve it,” he added.

For the blockist leader, what’s happening in health care and education is also happening in justice, in the security forces, and even in the housing sector, “in which the government makes consistent statements about measures that come down to absolute zero while people see his life more and more”. more unstable.”

“Democratic debate in Portugal should, above all, talk about the specific conditions of people’s lives. It is very difficult for the people of Portugal to continue to hear statements about whether there is stability in politics, let alone the conditions for the stability of people’s lives,” he said.

“People are what matter. You need to know how people will be able to pay their supermarket bills, will they have a house to live in, will they go to the hospital to find out, open and if there is a school for their children with teachers,” he concluded.

In this sense, Katarina Martins insisted on the idea of ​​discussing the “objective position of the people in the country” because otherwise “there is a risk of debates between political heroes who say absolutely nothing to the people.” “.