The PSD announced that its traditional Summer University will take place from August 25 to 31 in Castelo de Vide, Portalegre district, with the closing speech to be delivered by Prime Minister Luís Montenegro.
Over seven days, “one hundred selected young individuals will receive training on national, European, and international politics, from the economy to energy, from state reform to education and culture,” the statement emphasized.
The event will feature guest speaker and presidential candidate Luís Marques Mendes, who will address attendees at a dinner conference on August 28, along with European Commissioner for Financial Services, Capital Markets Union, and Savings and Investments, Maria Luís Albuquerque, giving a lecture on “Our Common Europe.”
Both Luís Marques Mendes and Maria Luís Albuquerque participated in the previous edition of the PSD Summer University in 2024.
With just over a month before the municipal elections, the Summer University will also host speeches by PSD candidates for the country’s two largest cities: Lisbon and Porto.
Carlos Moedas, the current president of the Lisbon City Council and candidate for re-election, will speak on the first day, while Pedro Duarte, the Porto mayoral candidate, will deliver a lecture on the “challenges of artificial intelligence.”
The university will also feature speeches from various government officials, including the Minister for State Reform, Gonçalo Matias, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Paulo Rangel, the Minister of Economy and Territorial Cohesion, Manuel Castro Almeida, and the Minister of Culture, Youth and Sports, Margarida Balseiro Lopes.
In addition to these PSD-connected personalities, the Summer University will host current university professor and former PS minister Nuno Severiano Teixeira, who will engage in a discussion with Paulo Rangel on “A World with More Radicalism,” along with figures like neuropediatrician Tiago Proença dos Santos and polling expert Alexandre Picoto.
This will mark the 21st edition of the PSD Summer University, an initiative that began in 2003, held annually in Castelo de Vide, with the only interruptions occurring in 2020 and 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The director of the Summer University, Carlos Coelho, noted in the statement that “the PSD’s strategic investment in training has borne fruit with a new generation of highly potential and willing individuals ready to engage.”
The Summer University is a joint initiative of the PSD, the Social Democratic Youth (JSD), the party’s delegation in the European Parliament, and the Francisco Sá Carneiro Institute.
