The Budget and Finance Committee today approved the urgent hearing of former Finance Minister Fernando Medina, currently a PS MP, to explain the reduction in public debt.
The hearing was requested by the CDS-PP and received votes in favor from all the parliamentary groups present, including the PS.
Last week, at the party congress, the CDS-PP parliamentary leader announced this request, accusing the previous government, of which Fernando Medina was Finance Minister, of having made an “artificial reduction” in the debt with “pension money”.
Paulo Núncio said that the Technical Budget Support Unit (UTAO) “warned that the debt reduction carried out by the Socialist government in 2023 was merely artificial” and that “it was only done with money from the Social Security Financial Stabilization Fund and the Caixa Geral de Aposentações”.
Paulo Núncio considered this situation “extremely serious” and that the former minister must answer to parliament.
Last week, the UTAO warned that the reduction in public debt in 2023 was “artificial” and that there are cases in which financial management options were conditioned by guidelines from the past government.
The public debt ratio stood at 99.1% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 2023 and in nominal terms fell by 9.3 billion euros compared to the previous year, to 263.1 billion euros.
