“This is how the system has always worked. We pretend to oppose each other, but in fact, we are each other’s best allies,” said André Ventura.
André Ventura spoke during the launch of Chega’s electoral program for the legislative elections scheduled for May 18, under the slogan “Save Portugal,” held at a hotel in Lisbon.
On Tuesday, at the Fabrica 2030 conference, organized by the newspaper Eco in Lisbon, Pedro Nuno Santos expressed hope that a parliamentary inquiry into Spinumviva would not be necessary.
“I hope that by the end of the election campaign, we will have clarified what still needs clarification,” stated the Secretary-General of the PS.
The Chega leader also accused socialists and social democrats of uniting to become “the center, the epicenter, the brand, and the protection of widespread corruption in Portugal.”
“Chega was clear, saying that harsher penalties and confiscation of corruptors’ assets are necessary,” Ventura said, criticizing the government for announcing a draft law today, to be subjected to public discussion, which deepens the mechanism of classic and expanded asset loss, including after crimes are prescribed or the defendants die.
“Now, three weeks before the elections, they say that Chega was right all along,” he remarked, calling for serious consideration of his views.
The president of Chega indicated his intent to “proceed with the widespread confiscation of assets” and reiterated that if his party forms the government, it will “present the largest anti-corruption package in the country’s history” on its first day, without providing specifics.
In the electoral program released today, Chega states its intention to “reform the system of seizure, confiscation, and restitution to the State (and possible victims) of the assets and proceeds of economic-financial crime, ensuring, as in Anglo-Saxon systems, an effective seizure of assets even before the final conviction and the related speed of the process in question.”
Ventura also claimed that “the government had a year to introduce an anti-corruption package but never did, lest the law fall upon itself.”
