The Prime Minister today noted the willingness expressed by the PS to negotiate a strategic defense agreement proposal and expressed hopes for “the broadest consensus possible,” indicating plans to further engage with the Socialists and Chega.
“Our intention was and always is to secure the broadest consensus possible, and I believe it won’t be hard, given the known positions of the main Portuguese political parties, to align our security and defense policy with the strategic interest this new era might also offer for boosting our economy,” he stated.
Luís Montenegro spoke to journalists at the end of the inauguration ceremony of the new Sintra Hospital, following questions about the challenge posed by the PS Secretary-General to negotiate a proposal for a “Strategic Agreement for a National Development and Defense Capacity Plan.”
An audience requested by José Luís Carneiro “will naturally be scheduled,” he noted, adding that the government will “speak with all political parties, but particularly with the two main opposition parties,” namely PS and Chega.
Luís Montenegro declined to “discuss methodologies” at this point, highlighting that “what is really important is for Portugal to fulfill its commitments, something that unfortunately hasn’t happened in the last decade.”
“We are committed to doing so, having made that commitment in the international context and within our Atlantic alliance, and we positively view the main opposition parties’ readiness to cooperate with the government, whether directly or in the parliamentary context, especially when initiatives go through parliament,” he stated.
The Prime Minister indicated that the government already has “a pre-determined investment plan, which is the Military Programming Law, but it naturally needs to be now integrated into these new objectives, both for 2025 and for subsequent years.”
The PS Secretary-General challenged the Prime Minister to negotiate with the Socialists a proposal for a “Strategic Agreement for a National Development and Defense Capacity Plan” within three months.
The newspaper Público reports that a letter sent Friday to Luís Montenegro by the socialist requests a formal audience to start this understanding and criticizes the surprise announcement by Portugal at the NATO Summit regarding the increase in Defense investment to 2% of GDP this year and 5% by 2035.
Carneiro argues that decisions of this magnitude require broad political consensus and proposes the establishment of a joint PSD/PS parliamentary working group which, in coordination with the government and representatives “of sectors relevant to the matter at hand,” could present within three months a proposal for a Strategic Agreement for a National Development and Defense Capacity Plan.
In the letter, the PS Secretary-General states that such a consensus “should be based on structuring principles, shared strategic guidelines, and a set of concrete measures,” involving the sectors of industry, science, innovation, education, and public administration.
At the last NATO summit held in The Hague in late June, Prime Minister Luís Montenegro stated that Portugal will need to increase its Defense budget by about one billion euros by the end of the year to reach 2% of GDP, which will be achieved through “valuing human resources,” advancing some Military Programming Law targets, and investing in infrastructures.
At that summit, the allies committed to investing 5% of GDP in military expenses by 2035, of which 3.5% would be strictly related to Defense and an additional 1.5% in other investments such as infrastructure and industry.
