I am watching Portuguese news right now and there is a very angry debate going on between Luís Montenegro and André Ventura.
I cannot understand what they are saying really but it seems that Portugal is having an election due to “conflict of interest” regarding Montenegro’s family business. My Vavó said something about the PM’s wife but even she is confused about it. I find it funny that they’re having these two right-wing dudes go off on each other on TV but nothing for the PCP-CDU.
I’ve tried to explain to my Vavó that the Ventura guy sucks but it’s difficult to get a handle on things (she thinks he has good points on calling the current PM a liar). Isn’t he also a fan of Salazar? Is Portuguese media trying to drum up more support for CHEGA?
I am always worried about Portugal and since it’s the day before April 25th (anniversary of the Carnation Revolution) I’m a bit more antsy.
Oh yeah, the media has always given the far-right party (Chega) a disproportional amount of screen time. Meanwhile the communists get suppressed. The problem is that the far-right managed to steal a lot of votes in former communist bastions. Regions in the interior that were far-left (for decades), have now shifted to the far-right. So PCP went from ~7% to barely above 3%. They also stole a lot of votes from the center, so forming a stable government is quite hard. But this is probably good because the right wing has more votes now.
What shocks me is how the media has managed to turn so many people into neoliberals. I hear so many people parroting neoliberal talking points like, how they are tired of paying high taxes (hilarious, because our taxes are average by EU standards), they claim public companies are a burden and should be privatized. Even public healthcare is seen as a burden, many think just relying on private insurances would be better, since they’re paying “twice”.
People here just don’t learn anything from mistakes from the past. Examples:
- Privatization of our public gas/petrol company -> Results in one of the highest gas/petrol prices in EU.
- Privatization of our public electricity company (to China lol) -> Results in one of the highest electricity prices in the EU. (While exporting electricity to other countries!!!)
- Privatization of our public mail company -> Results in shitty degraded service.
But now the privatization of healthcare and the public airline company will suddenly fix everything? My god, how can people be so blind? It feels hopeless to argue against this.
This is incredibly sad to see, and as the years go by I see myself becoming more and more cynical, which is unfortunate. Did people forget about Salazar and what a disaster that was? Does the education system fail on that front?
I know Portugal has the concept of “saudade” but it can’t be this bad, can it? People are so easy to manipulate into the right, yet I don’t think the same can be said for the left. I am scared for what will come in this new election, I can only hope that people realize that CHEGA is not the way to go.
Apparently there’s a lot of racism involved. Many are anti-immigration, so they vote for them. But if I’m right in my analysis, Chega and IL will eventually replace all parties and become the analogous version of the Republicans and Democrats. I wonder if there is US involvement at play.
Yes I do recall the anti-immigrant sentiment from a while back, it is such a shame. Portugal is no different from the rest of Europe it seems, what a shame. I really hope they don’t get stuck between a two party, IL vs CHEGA, system but we will have to see. Maybe they will pull through and choose a better option.
I would not doubt US involvement since they got pissy when the Carnation Revolution happened. Most Americans probably do not think much about Portugal but considering it was a founding member of NATO and the EU there is probably some intervention on some level.
This comment was pretty helpful for me https://hexbear.net/comment/6065831
Thank you for bringing this to my attention, it was very helpful! It seems like the public prosecutor is a reoccurring problem here, I had no idea that the PNS was also in hot water since the news show we have on doesn’t seem to be too focused on him regarding the scandal, I have seen him covered but the context is a bit different. I use my translator a lot and can understand a few of the words so that is how I know. Also, now I know why I saw Costa sitting next to the German lady in the EU, he is now the president which is interesting.
Anyway the whole comment was incredibly illuminating on the way politics are handled in Portugal and I appreciate it a lot. It unfortunately seems just as messy as here, but the new “socialist” leader seems pretty decent, although I still prefer the PCP.
