“The scheduled date is the earliest possible to avoid politicizing a topic that should receive all technical clarifications, as has been done,” stated Carlos Moedas (PSD) in a written response.
The issue is a request put forth on Sunday by the PS, along with Livre, BE, and Cidadãos por Lisboa (elected by the PS/Livre coalition), for an extraordinary meeting on Thursday, September 25, to obtain “clarifications on falsehoods, omissions, and inconsistencies” regarding the Gloria elevator accident.
“The PS saw the tragedy of the Glória elevator as an opportunity to try to politicize and gain votes. This alone justifies the rushed request for a third meeting on the topic in less than three weeks!” considered social democrat Carlos Moedas, running for a second term in the municipal elections on October 12.
The Glória elevator in Lisbon, managed by the municipal company Carris, derailed on September 3, causing 16 deaths and about twenty injuries, including Portuguese and foreigners of various nationalities.
In a notice published today on the municipality’s website, the mayor announced an extraordinary meeting for October 13 at 16:00, with the sole agenda of updating the information on the Glória elevator accident.
“In the two meetings already held, one exclusively with the Carris administration, the councilors had the opportunity to question and request all the information they wanted on the topic. We fail to see the point of this PS request, besides a matter of potential political gain,” expressed Carlos Moedas.
The mayor reiterated that all data and elements regarding the Glória elevator accident are being investigated by the competent authorities and inspections, as requested from the start.
“We remain fully available to clarify for the people of Lisbon,” he stated.
The PS request, also signed by Livre, BE, and Cidadãos por Lisboa, for an extraordinary meeting, came after two media reports, questioning, notably, “the occurrence of two previous accidents — in October 2024 and May 2025 — which were publicly denied by the president of the Carris Board of Directors and the deputy mayor of Lisbon, but which Carris itself has now confirmed.”
The PCP also considered that there are contradictory pieces of information regarding the determination of responsibility for the Glória elevator accident and demanded “comprehensive clarification” from the mayor, including on the public tender launched in 2022, “given the abnormally low price presented by the company MNTC, Lda., which won the contract for maintenance work on the elevators operated by Carris.”
According to the PCP, recent television reports contradict what was stated and assured by the mayor and the Carris Board of Directors, evidencing, even with documentary proof, the existence of substantiated alerts by Carris workers’ organizations about deficient safety system functioning on the elevator, raising questions about the quality of the maintenance carried out.
Thus, the communist councilors proposed a hearing with the representatives of the workers’ organizations, a new hearing with the Carris Board of Directors to “clarify contradictions” regarding aspects of the maintenance process, and a hearing with members of the previous Board on decisions made in tenders before 2022.
