In the final stage of voting on the OE2026 specialty, the Chega party successfully passed their proposal, with opposition from PS and abstentions from Livre, PCP, and IL.
“In 2026, the government will promote training, follow-up, and awareness-raising activities among migrant communities from countries where Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) is a cultural practice, as well as among Health, Education, Security Forces professionals, and technicians who support these communities,” states the proposal.
The aim of this measure, according to Chega, is “to prevent the occurrence of these human rights violations against girls and women.”
The party justifies the proposal by citing that “in 2023, there were 223 cases, representing an increase of more than 17% compared to 2022, when 190 cases were detected, according to data from the Directorate-General of Health.”
“In 2024, 254 women victims of female genital mutilation were identified in Portuguese health services. This is the highest number since 2015, and more than 130 of them have health issues resulting from the practice,” they add.
Chega notes that “for nine years, reports of female genital mutilation cases have been increasing in Portugal.”
At this final stage, a PS proposal was approved to transfer one million euros from the Ministry of Culture, Youth, and Sport to the Commission for Citizenship and Gender Equality (CIG).
This amount is intended for the training of technical teams specializing in supporting and accompanying violence victims, “equipping them for intervention with people with disabilities, deaf, neurodivergent, and impaired victims of domestic, gender, or other forms of violence.”
The proposal also specifies that this funding will be used for national prevention and awareness campaigns on domestic, gender, and institutional violence, “explicitly including violence against the mentioned groups.”
Additionally, a PSD/CDS-PP proposal was passed, allowing the transfer of up to two million five hundred thousand euros from the Environmental Fund budget to the Autonomous Region of the Azores “for compensation payments to the fishing sector concerning the establishment of the Azores Marine Park.”
