“The President of the Republic is the last person who can and should comment on his successor, but what I can say is that with the diversity of debates and interviews on all channels for all candidates, no one will have doubts, and there is still a lot of time before the elections,” stated Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa.
The head of state, who mentioned he has been following all the debates, pointed out that “the fact that the campaign started very early has this great advantage.”
“There are candidates who have been under scrutiny, that is, followed by the Portuguese, for over six months and many were already known before,” he declared.
“Therefore, this means it is very different, for example, from when I was a candidate; I decided to run in October, now there are candidates who revealed themselves since spring. We are at the end of the year, this is very enlightening and the Portuguese can decide calmly,” he noted.
Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa also considered that campaigns are now different from what they used to be. In the past, campaigns were conducted in the streets, even in winter. Today, the power of audiovisual media, television in general, and social media, with more sophisticated means, have completely changed the campaign.”
The President of the Republic was speaking to journalists on the sidelines of the Manuel António da Mota awards ceremony, at the Alfândega do Porto.
