Present today at the Centro Cultural de Belém in Lisbon to signal the start of the Pedala Portugal Bike Tour 2024, on the same day that the Vuelta a España cycling race (La Vuelta) starts from Lisbon, Luís Montenegro stated that the support announced during the PSD’s political ‘reentry’ does not constitute electioneering, contrary to what the largest opposition party, the PS, argues.
“We are pedaling on various fronts, but we are pedaling responsibly so as not to run into any walls, not to fall off the bicycle, not to have any slips, and we will always do this based on criteria of responsibility and budgetary balance,” and “we do not have a posture of first punishing the people with taxes, contributions, postponement of public investments to later present financial niceties,” said Luís Montenegro, comparing political management to cycling.
“The ultimate goal of politics is the well-being of people. We want a country that is developed, that creates a lot of wealth, we want a country where work and wealth creation don’t pay so many taxes, but we also want to distribute when it is within our sphere of availability, without penalizing” the country’s development, he added.
According to the Prime Minister, “this Government does not speak for corporations or political parties, it speaks for the country and for the people.”
Emphasizing that, as a minority Government, the PSD/CDS executive is in the “political and public debate” with “all democratic humility and all democratic culture,” Montenegro refused to “govern the country thinking about what those responsible for institutions, organizations or even political parties say.”
