In a statement, the Excutive Commission confirmed, at the end of the afternoon, that “following the first meeting (…) Abel Matos Santos presented his resignation from the position of member he held in this body, thus not allowing his past statements may raise doubts about the political tradition in which the CDS unquestionably belongs “.
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At issue are the statements that Abel Matos Santos made, from 2012 to 2015, in various publications on the social network Facebook, with praise for Salazar and PIDE. Portugal’s consul in Bordeaux, Aristides Sousa Mendes, also called the “loan shark of the Jews”, who helped save thousands of Jews during World War II.
Matos Santos reacted, when these statements were known, without denying the authorship of the phrases. The weekly Expresso stated that “purging phrases from these texts and decontextualizing them is not a serious exercise”.
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It’s late, the CDS-PP president had pointed out that the party has always rejected “any totalitarian regimes” and is on the side of those who “believe in democracy and freedoms”. Francisco Rodrigues dos Santos spoke to journalists after being received by the cardinal-patriarch of Lisbon, Manuel Clemente, in Lisbon.
“The Jewish community knows that there is a party in Portugal that has always defended the State of Israel, has always been on the side of those who believe in democracy, in freedoms, a party that has always asserted itself against any totalitarian regimes, in defense of the peoples’ self-determination” , said the centrist leader. “To that extent, the CDS has always followed these same causes and subscribes to its entire legacy and history, which is absolutely clear in this matter”, he stressed.
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Abel Matos Santos entered the race for the succession of the ex-president of the party, Assunção Cristas, but he never got to take his motion to votes, having given up in favor of the current president of the CDS-PP, Francisco Rodrigues dos Santos.
The clinical psychologist was part of the lists presented by the current leader, having been elected in a congress member of the executive committee, which he is now leaving.
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