Presidential candidate Henrique Gouveia e Melo accused his opponent André Ventura of being part of the system, just like all other candidates for the January 2026 presidential elections, contrary to what Ventura wants his supporters to believe.
During a visit to a local health unit in Coimbra, the admiral claimed that the leader of Chega has “dictatorial tendencies” and “would perhaps like to be president of Venezuela” to “imprison opponents at will.”
“He is nostalgic for the times of Salazar. Perhaps for the poverty levels that existed at that time. Perhaps for the lack of freedom at that time. Indeed, the political power used to imprison. It used to imprison opponents. Whoever was inconvenient and whoever contradicted the truth that the system wanted to reproduce,” Gouveia e Melo highlighted to journalists present at the scene.
However, according to the admiral, what André Ventura does is reproduce “an alternative truth,” repeat a “lie over and over until it seems true and creates an effect,” as the “Nazis” did.
“To me, that doesn’t seem like a democratic attitude or respect towards other candidates. The discussion of ideas is much more important than trying to create facts and effects, especially based on falsehoods,” he stressed, recalling that André Ventura often says he is “anti-system,” which is also “a falsehood.”
“The candidate [Ventura] is of the system. He has a party, and he is engaging in his tribal and partisan battles. Therefore, this candidate is not anti-system; he is so much a part of the system that he joins all the other candidates from within the system to fight the only candidate from outside the system, which is me,” he assured.
It should be noted that André Ventura recently accused Gouveia e Melo of zigzagging and moving closer to the Socialist Party (PS) and the Left Bloc (BE).
The leader of Chega accused his opponent Gouveia e Melo of zigzagging and aligning with PS and BE, while refuting criticisms that his party is a threat to democracy.
Lusa | 17:44 – 24/10/2025
Pedro Duarte, elected on October 12th in the local elections as the President of the Porto City Council, argued on Sunday that the admiral, who led the Covid-19 vaccine task force, initially presented himself as an alternative to Chega but is now closer to the Left.
“We do not know his political thinking on any matter […]. He emerged from an opportunistic candidacy, trying to occupy a natural space of Chega, more populist. At a certain point, he became a center-left figure. This does not provide guarantees. Someone who moves depending on whether the wind is blowing more to the Left or the Right is not what is desired for a President of the Republic,” he emphasized, adding that “if he [Gouveia e Melo] wants to be a winning candidate, he still has a lot to prove.”
