The leader of the PSD/Madeira and the Regional Government, Miguel Albuquerque, defended that the party must win the next European elections, considering that it must “take consequences” if it fails to achieve a good result.
“We have to win the next European elections,” said the Madeiran Social Democrat leader in an interview with RTP3’s “Grande Entrevista” program, broadcast on Wednesday night.
But if the PSD doesn’t win that election, he added: “I’m part of the national bodies, I’m the first to say that we should take consequences.”
Miguel Albuquerque, who has reapplied for a third term as president of Madeira’s regional government, was the head of the PSD/CDS-PP coalition that won the regional legislative elections on Sunday, but fell one MP short of an absolute majority, having announced on Tuesday a parliamentary agreement with PAN, which won a mandate.
The PSD/Madeira had the presence of the national leader, Luis Montenegro, at the end of the campaign and on election night, and Albuquerque considered that visits by national leaders “have no influence” on the results.
“It has an influence because I think the party is the same. He [Luis Montenegro] did well. He came to Chão da Lagoa [the annual PSD/Madeira party] to accompany the party at regional level. There’s no problem, it’s not even a very relevant issue. I think it went well,” he said.
In Miguel Albuquerque’s opinion, this is a question of “lana-caprina”.
“I think Luis Montenegro has to break with this history, he has to be a politician with risk,” he said, mentioning that the national leader “is criticized for everything” and that all the controversies involving him are “talk to entertain”.
Albuquerque stressed that Montenegro “did well to come” to Madeira, “showing solidarity” as the party’s national leader with the regional PSD, praising the “good proposal” for reducing taxes that he presented at the PSD’s rentrée.
Asked about Pedro Passos Coelho’s possible return to politics, Albuquerque said that the former leader and prime minister “was very wronged”, since he “held the country together in a very complicated situation”, following an economic and financial adjustment program.
In his opinion, Passos Coelho “did a patriotic job, which was then distorted” and turned into a “bogeyman”.
“I don’t know what he wants to do,” he said, adding: “I think the European elections will be very important for the new political cycle and the PSD should take advantage of it.”
In Sunday’s elections in Madeira, the PSD/CDS-PP coalition elected 23 deputies, the PS 11, the JPP five and Chega four, while the CDU (PCP/PEV), BE, PAN and IL elected one deputy each.
