“Well, they [Chega] have already tried, so patriotic, starting to like the country, like the people who live in the country, and respect the people who live in the country, it’s an idea, just a note for the `drink´ [beverage]. And by the way, in particular, to respect those who have lived in this country for many centuries and, yes, I am talking about the Roma community,” declared Rui Tavares during a rally held at the Academia Almadense in Almada, in the district of Setúbal.
In a thirty-minute speech before a packed room, the leader of Livre asserted that there is nothing he respects less than someone who chooses the most stigmatized community to further demean and attack.
Amidst applause and chants of “freedom, freedom, freedom” from the audience, Rui Tavares affirmed that Livre will combat “anti-Roma sentiment” in this country even if it is not fashionable, even if some wish to normalize “anti-Roma sentiment.”
“Yes, Livre is proudly for the inclusion of all because, yes, the country is diverse,” he stated.
In his view, “there is nothing as ugly in a human being as someone who chooses to kick those who are down, nor is there anything as beautiful as someone who chooses to lift others up.”
He questioned, “Has that far-right leader ever tried to lend a hand and lift others up? Has he ever thought about those Roma men and women who belong to this country and have been here for centuries, who, for centuries, were forced not to stay more than two or three days in each city?”
This was why the Roma were excluded and driven away even when they participated in the defense of this country’s independence, as happened in 1640, he emphasized.
Rui Tavares remarked that it must be very tiring to be on the far-right and go around all the time with so much hatred and prejudice.
“I understand why André Ventura doesn’t go anywhere without a driver because it must be a torment for him to take the ferry and come to the other side of the river, always looking around and saying that’s an immigrant, that’s a person of color, that’s LGBT, and that one has a tattoo,” he stressed.
