Pedro Nuno Santos heard today at the TAP investigative committee

Former Minister Pedro Nuno Santos will be heard in Parliament this Thursday for the second time in a few days, now before a TAP commission of inquiry, over the disputed compensation for Alexandra Reis that caused her to leave government.

After several months of silence and a suspension of his mandate at his request, the former Minister of Infrastructure and Housing was heard last week in the Commission for the Economy, Public Works, Planning and Housing at the request of the PSD on the situation with TAP between 2015 and 2023.

Pedro Nuno Santos resigned after paying €500,000 compensation to former TAP administrator Alexandra Reis, who was finance minister, when the payment, which she was not entitled to, was reported morning PostDecember 24, 2022.

After claiming that he was not informed of the compensation, and following his resignation, Pedro Nuno Santos clarified in a statement that he, then Secretary of State for Infrastructure Hugo Mendez, and Chief of Staff Maria Antonia Araujo “had no memory” that they knew on compensation and that the minister had given “political consent to close the process”.

At a hearing last week, the ex-governor suggested there had been “difficult months of waiting because the will to respond was great,” but added that the problems that led to his departure from government would have to wait until he visited government. TAP Investigation Commission.

Pedro Nuno Santos answered questions about TAP’s shareholder reconfiguration following the 2015 privatization, the so-called Airbus funds, the airline’s emergency bailout in 2020 following the covid-19 pandemic, and the €55 million paid to David Nieleman for his departure from the company. .

The former minister argued that if the evidence found in the audit of the Airbus deal by former TAP private shareholder David Nieleman, which indicates the possibility that the airline is paying above the market price, is true, you should “demand contract renegotiation.”

As for the 55 million paid to a former private shareholder, Pedro Nuno Santos said it was in line with the “meeting point” between the parties in dispute to avoid litigation.

Pedro Nuno Santos also stressed that he is “very proud of the work” done by the government to “save TAP”, having managed to prove that the airline, as a “state-owned company, can make a profit.”

“It was no coincidence, because in the year that TAP made a profit, we also managed to make a profit for CP for the first time in our history. There is no longer a government or a minister who, in the last 50 years, can boast of having left his duties with TAP and CP, making a profit,” he stressed.