The Chamber says Stop cannot continue to operate “without security conditions.”

Economic adviser to the Chamber of Porto said on Tuesday that the Stop shopping center cannot continue to operate “without security conditions” and that the musicians have been warned to close “one day, one day less”.

“Musicians have already been warned, and we spoke to the musicians association, that this was a scenario that was supposed to happen more than a day, less than a day. No one can say that I did not count. Nobody. “, he told Luce to Richard Valente.

More than a hundred shops at the Stop shopping center on Rua do Heroismo in Porto were sealed on Tuesday by the municipal police “due to a lack of operating licenses,” the Porto City Council justified.

Speaking to the Lusa agency, the adviser stressed that the municipality “cannot take risks” by allowing the shutdown to continue “without minimum conditions to ensure the safety of goods and, above all, people.”

“We are facing a mall where 106 stores are not licensed to use. The mall has already had two fires, there are no means of emergency exit, elevators do not work properly, there is no regulation and they do not have a legal condominium, because most do not have a license to use the stores located there, ”he said.

Stressing that the Chamber of Porto sought to be “part of the solution”, Ricardo Valente stated, however, that the municipality must be “consistent” and “follow the rules”.

“We cannot have a situation in which lawlessness is allowed simply because it exists. We are closing a lot of establishments in the city, we are closing bars, cafes, laundries, businesses and factories because they do not comply with the law,” he said. emphasizing that the building is not a municipal building and that “it was not the City Council of Porto who discovered the problem.”

“The problem was solved by condominiums, shop owners who did not have a license to use and leased shops to musicians. On what basis in lease agreements – I don’t know. On what basis of payment – I don’t know. , do Porto. The competence of the Chamber of Porto is to protect the rule of law space that does not have licenses to use and keep people and goods safe, that’s what we do,” he added.

Asked about the ongoing licensing process, the adviser explained that he was aiming to “open an emergency exit” in the building, but in a meeting with the stop’s administration and the musicians, he was told, “We don’t have and won’t do any work.”

Also asked if the upper floors of the Silo Auto would remain available to accommodate Stop musicians, Ricardo Valente said the option would be “always open”.

“We are available and will remain available. We believe that what is happening there, from the point of view of musical activity, is extremely important. It makes sense and we want to cherish such logic, but not in conditions where we have a completely illegal situation,” he added.

The Stop shopping center has been operating as a cultural space for over 20 years, and several of its floors are used as rehearsal rooms or studios for various artists.

In a conversation with reporters, the administrator of the Stop shopping center admitted that he was taken by surprise by the closure, saying that he was not notified of the actions of the municipal police.

The Stop Mall Musicians’ Association warned on Tuesday that the nearly 500 artists have “nowhere to go” as there is “nowhere to make noise.”

According to a report by Jornal de Notícias from the end of October 2022, the Stop shopping center “has structural problems that “compromise the safety of the building and those who visit it”, according to a diagnosis made by the municipality.

In February, at a meeting in the mayor’s office, the mayor announced that the association of musicians “Stop” and the administration of the condominium were invited to occupy the upper floors of “Silo-auto”.

“They told us they didn’t want to, that they didn’t care because they wanted to continue at the stop,” Rui Moreira said, saying that the municipality could create a public access on the last two floors of the Silo Auto. space in the “open space” model for musicians.