During a 40-minute speech at the Escola do Mar dos Açores on the island of Faial, the President of the Republic discussed the progress of various projects in the region, describing himself as a “realistic optimist,” yet noting that he has “never managed to be an irritating optimist.”
“Irritating optimists, in some matters, go further than I have ever gone in life or will go. They have the merit. The merit of having an excess of energy, albeit at a younger age,” he remarked, referring to the President of the European Council and former Prime Minister António Costa, whom he used to describe as an “irritating optimist” during his administration.
In the same address, the President reflected on his future and expressed what he termed as “envy” for his successor, who will witness the progress of projects currently under development in the Azores, recounting a biblical story he had also narrated at a PSD congress when he led the party.
“I feel like Moses. Moses reached the River Jordan, and then looked across and said ‘Well, I won’t cross, I’ll stay on this side, I see the promised land, but I’ll remain here. I will depart for another world, less material and more immaterial, before crossing the river to see the promised land.’ Well, if it were today, I would have laid down in the river, swum, and crossed the river,” he stated.
The President expressed envy for his successor “because he will have ten years to see” what he has seen in the “prehistory of prehistory” happening in the Azorean archipelago.
The President of the Republic is on the second of four days of his visit to the Azores, with his trip to the island of Faial focusing on marine research and the geostrategic importance of the sea.
