The President of the Republic, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, on Saturday praised the energy of the Prime Minister, António Costa, and justified why he spoke of the Government’s fatigue, considering that he shares some of that “inevitable exhaustion”.
The head of state was speaking with António Costa at his side, at a joint press conference when they were about to finish the works of the 28th Ibero-American Summit, in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, in which they participated together.
Asked if he sees António Costa tired, regarding his analysis that the current PS governance started with a “tired majority”, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa replied: “The Prime Minister has an energy that is on the test, as you can see So, personally, he doesn’t show any signs of being tired.”
“What I said, I was listing the reasons why it was a very complicated year”, he explained, referring that “foreign policy concerns” in his opinion postponed “responses to domestic policy issues”.
According to the President of the Republic, “it is evident that the leadership and key elements of the Government had withstood situations, which incidentally were referred to here today as pathological, such as the pandemic and the period leading up to the war and, whether in one case or another , with economic and financial crises and social repercussions that were evident”.
This “although the Government was substantially different – the Prime Minister later said that there had been changes in the Government, and a Government lives on, and then there are subsequent changes to the Government’s tenure to adjust to reality”, he observed.
In addition, he pointed out, at the internal level, “the end of the excessive deficit process” and “the cleaning and consolidation of the banking system”.
As a result of these factors, the third Government headed by António Costa, who took office a year ago, cannot be compared to “a fresh majority in the sense of having just been elected”, without “having faced before I don’t know how many problems with the cost, the tiredness in the sense of the inevitable wear and tear that this has”, he maintained.
“But what about the Government and about the President. The President too, in his own way, not being an executive, doesn’t wear out in the same way”, he added.
Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa concluded the explanation of his words in an interview with RTP about two weeks ago, declaring: “I limited myself to making this analysis of the circumstances”.
The Prime Minister, António Costa, then commented: “In short, we left very comforted”.
Next, the President of the Republic was also asked to clarify whether or not he considers that the majority of the PS is tired, and he responded by highlighting the intensity of those who exercise government functions.
As an example, he said that at the official dinner of the summit, on Friday, he was with António Costa “to review what had happened in the meantime of Portuguese internal politics in the last 48 hours or 72 hours”.
Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa also noted “two characteristics” that distinguish the relationship between the two: “One is that there are no papers in the hearings and in the work meetings with the Prime Minister”.
“There is no notice, no minutes, no magnetic or electronic record. The second issue is that the meeting is once a week. But do you think the facts wait for Thursday? They don’t,” he said.
