Manuel Fernando Araújo / Lusa
Marques Mendes’ presidential campaign director Duarte Marques today accused Rui Rio of supporting Gouveia and Melo to Belém as an “opportunity to make his little revenge” and not for the national interest.
Former PSD leader Rui Rio was presented on Saturday in Porto, as from Gouveia and Melo to President of the Republic.
“It was not the national interest that put Rui Rio to support Gouveia and Melo but an idea of revenge. Rio does not deal well with criticism. And never dealt well with the independence of Luís Marques Mendes as a commentator. Thus, he took this opportunity to make his little revenge, ”criticized the former PSD deputy Duarte Marques, in a publication on the social network X.
In his intervention in Porto, Rui Rio argued that the country needs a president who “does not get lost in the single comment”, but bet on what is “noble and structuring”.
For the former social democratic leader between 2018 and 2022, the country needs a head of state “that is not close at the Belém Palace and enjoy the media to talk to the Portuguese, but who Don’t fall into temptation to make it a way of life ”.
“We need a President with dimension and sense of stateConditions essential for a full exercise of their duties: to be the true guardian of the regular functioning of democratic institutions, the referee and moderator between powers, and, fundamentally, the entity of the last resort of national life, because admittedly free, exempt and independent, ”said Rio.
Admiral Gouveia and Melo formally presented his candidacy for president of the Republic on Thursday, the same day PSD approved the support To former leader Marques Mendes to Belém.
Mendes, who was a television commentator at SIC for over a decade, Bethlehem in early February in Fafe for the January presidential elections next year.
