“I think that what we witnessed today is very sad from a moral standpoint. I heard Luís Montenegro say it was personal, but we all know that television stations were invited to record it,” Pedro Nuno Santos told journalists at the end of a rally in Vila Real.
According to the leader of the PS, if it was a personal moment for the prime minister, there was no need to “invite television stations to record the moment.”
“I think it’s just sad; it’s instrumentalizing faith for electoral campaign purposes, but it says a lot about who Luís Montenegro is,” he asserted.
The president of the PSD stated today that the meeting he had with his wife Carla, who is a pilgrim to Fátima, was of a personal nature and rejected the notion that his visit could be used for political gain.
“It was to fulfill her profession of faith, and it is a personal component of hers,” he argued in remarks to journalists on the sidelines of a campaign event in Ovar before being questioned on whether his action would not draw criticism from the opposition.
“That would be the last thing we’d need, [because] it’s a completely personal matter. It’s personal,” the prime minister emphasized.
Subsequently, however, Luís Montenegro was confronted with the fact that some media were pre-informed of his visit.
The social-democratic leader responded: “I don’t know if they were informed or not; those who could be there were – and that is not what’s significant.”
When pressed by journalists if his visit could be seen as political exploitation, he reacted: “What surprises me are your questions, to be honest.”
