BU says protests are a way to put pressure on the government, PKP talks about “social drama”

This Saturday, BE said the demonstrations were a way of putting pressure on the government with a PS supermajority to address issues such as housing, while the PCP criticized the lack of responses to this “social drama”.

Speaking to reporters in Lisbon at a protest for the right to housing and climate justice this afternoon, Bloc de Esquerda (BE) coordinator Mariana Mortagua criticized the PS parliamentary majority for failing “all measures that could have a practical impact on the right to housing ” and for “adhering to the law protecting speculation.”

“But with an absolute majority, there is only one way to put pressure on the Government so that it approves the laws and solves the problem: people on the streets, it is popular and social mobilization that will put pressure on the Government. That’s why this demonstration is so important. “, he emphasized.

The blocker considered that she was faced with “a crowd that had gathered to say the obvious: that the right to housing, that the need to have a home, a home for which you can pay a salary, is much more important and worth much more than speculation, than business, than light profit”.

“And for now the truth is that this business controls the destinies of the country,” he complained.

PCP Secretary General Paulo Raimundo was also present at the protest and criticized the government’s measures in the housing sector, which he called “insufficient, late and limited.”

“We are faced with a social drama of enormous proportions, a problem that affects thousands and thousands of people who every day deprive themselves of their most basic needs in order to do everything possible to support what is their greatest asset, which is their greatest asset . this is your home, your home, your home,” he warned.

Raimundo warned that “there are people who can no longer afford rent and skyrocketing payments,” and said it is a problem “that needs to be addressed head-on with concrete measures.”

The communist leader also criticized the bank’s profits: “What a scandal this is, when everything is tight, very tight, the bank manages to accumulate 11 million euros in profit per day, there is no need to even make any further comments.”

Answering the question that three Chegi deputies were escorted out of the demonstration site by the PSP at the beginning of the demonstration after protests from the participants, Paulo Raimundo did not want to “feed” the topic, saying only: “If people came here for some purpose, unfortunately they it was achieved, and the job was done.”

Bloc leader Mariana Mortagua considered the reaction of the protesters present to be “natural.”

“It seems natural to me that a far-right party that champions property speculation and the property business would not be well received at a housing rights demonstration,” he said.