Santos Silva warns that it would be worrying to make the legislature dependent on the European elections

These warnings were transmitted by Augusto Santos Silva, socialist deputy elected by the Fora da Europa circle and former Minister of State and Foreign Affairs, to the new "podcast" of the PS parliamentary group which makes its debut today.

Asked whether legislatures are increasingly dependent on the logic of electoral calendars, the President of the Assembly of the Republic rejected it and warned that it would be "to fall into a disturbing error not only to implying that the duration of the legislature depended on other elections – the so-called second order, namely European elections –, while suggesting that the duration of the legislatures should depend on the evolution of the ballots”.

“That would be profoundly undemocratic. Everyone knows that over the course of four years — and in this case four years that have six years behind them — there will be more or less favorable evolutions in the polls. Everyone knows that second-order elections are also times when the electorate can express their distance from the government, the electorate who will then vote for the government party,” he argued.

Augusto Santos Silva later underlined that "the European elections are used to elect the members of the European Parliament, the local elections are used to elect those elected in the municipalities, the regional elections already this year in Madeira are used to elect the Legislative Assembly of this region ".

"Point", underlined the former Minister of State and Foreign Affairs, arguing that the government "has all the necessary conditions to comply with the legislator".

"He has a majority in parliament, he has all the institutional collaboration of the other sovereign bodies - President of the Republic and parliament - he has a program that was supported by the people a very short time ago and, therefore, he has all the conditions. It is the responsibility of the government to take advantage of these unique conditions to carry out its own agenda and respond to the problems facing the country,” he added.

Regarding the teachers' strike, the former Minister of Education of the second executive led by António Guterres, stressed that "it is a right" and "absolutely normal in a democracy" that this professional class expresses its discontent.

“There is a process of negotiation going on – and that deserves a second salute, because in a democracy we not only listen to the people, but we also seek compromises with the people. A negotiation process in which the government has presented very strong proposals to resolve the difficulties that the unions are pointing out”, he underlined.

Already in an indirect allusion to the STOP (Union of all education professionals), the President of the Assembly of the Republic declared that there are "unions genuinely involved in the negotiation process", but there also has "forms of manipulation of the strike".

According to Augusto Santos Silva, there are "newer unions that see themselves as a somewhat outdated anarcho-syndical model."

“I do not accept that a professional class subcontracts a strike to another to obtain what it wants without this professional class going on strike. Therefore, what is said - and which, incidentally, families also find -, which is to have funds through which another professional class is solicited to close schools, does not seem inadmissible to me, "he said. he concluded.

The President of the Assembly of the Republic also criticized the “self-service” strike model.

“It also seems ethically inadmissible to me – I don't know if it's legal or not, the public prosecutor's office will say – this form of so-called self-service strike. That is to say, I go on strike when I want, once and not all day, and without notice. The social struggle, which we socialists understand as one of the engines of democracy, has rules,” he defended.

In this conversation, the President of the Assembly of the Republic rejected the thesis that he benefits Chega when he has direct debates with this political force.

“Who criticizes, who fights, who slows down, is an accomplice? So what would you call someone who doesn't criticize, fight, stop and even say they're available for deals? If the former are accomplices, what are the latter called? “, he wondered, here in an allusion to the current leadership of the PSD.

Still about Chega, Augusto Santos Silva advocated that he prefers to have all political currents in parliament, even those who are against democracy.

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