“To ensure safety in Sintra and in the country, we are here to welcome and accommodate immigrants, because we want to welcome people, we need to welcome people, but we must do so with responsibility and humanity,” stated Hugo Soares, adding, “we don’t need someone from Seixal coming here to confuse citizens with hamburgers.”
The social-democratic parliamentary leader, speaking at the presentation of Marco Almeida’s candidacy for the Sintra council by the PSD, IL, and PAN, began by saying that “Sintra does not need anyone from Seixal” and is “for the people of Sintra” and “does not need anyone to come here telling us what to do,” especially when “they don’t even know how to do it themselves.”
The deputy was referring to the Chega candidate, Rita Matias, alluding to the recent controversy involving the far-right party leader, André Ventura, who criticized the President of the Republic’s visit to a ‘Bürgerfest’, confusing citizens with hamburgers.
PS and Livre candidate Ana Mendes Godinho was also criticized by Soares, for promising “today what she never managed to do, nor wanted to do,” while part of the socialist government.
The social-democrat recalled that in the parliament in 2024, the PS “rushed to put an end to tolls on the so-called former Scuts [motorways without user costs],” joining “Chega,” and “together they removed the tolls” disregarding the costs.
“They didn’t care if the Government had, or didn’t have, another strategy for mobility in Portugal. The two joined forces and, legitimately, ended the tolls,” he noted, lamenting that “those who governed for eight years” had to go into the opposition to make decisions “they knew they shouldn’t make and that were irresponsible.”
“A candidate for mayor who in government says one thing and in opposition promises another cannot have the trust of the Sintra citizens,” he asserted, referencing the former Minister of Labour, Solidarity and Social Security’s promise that the municipality would assume toll exemption on the A16 for residents, workers, and companies in the council.
Hugo Soares reminisced over Fernando Seara’s tenure, who is running for the municipal assembly, asserting that “Sintra experienced 12 years of historical growth,” emphasizing that if Seara didn’t want to be elected and “did what he did,” Sintra residents can “imagine what will happen in the next 12 years with someone who truly wants to be the council president,” referring to Marco Almeida.
“A municipal council is not a piggy bank. What’s the use of having 300 or 400 million euros in the bank when the streets are full of potholes, unclean, with no development, and lacking social support?” he questioned, noting that the investment made could have been “leveraged through community funds.”
The PSD general secretary admitted that Marco Almeida, running for the third time, would have proceeded “with or without” party support because his “candidacy is worth much more than the parties it comprises.”
“To win this election, which will be fiercely contested until the end, will be challenging, and we will need a lot more than those who always vote for the PSD, the Liberal Initiative, and PAN,” he emphasized.
In his remarks, Fernando Seara addressed Manuela Ferreira Leite, who is endorsing Marco Almeida’s candidacy, stating they would “make peace,” recalling that in December 2001, he won the council seat against socialist Edite Estrela “without wanting” and when the then Lisbon district president of the PSD came to Sintra on a “rainy night” to congratulate him, he told her “doctor, disappear” as she “completely altered” his life.
The lawyer and sports commentator admitted he was “wrong that day,” as in “other moments” of his life, and thanked the former social-democratic minister.
Reviewing the work done over three mandates, Seara considered his former vice-president as “a man unafraid of great informal and even formal powers,” emphasizing that “his concern is the citizens, the people of Sintra, always the people of Sintra, whom he never abandoned and certainly never will.”
