“Tape cutter”: Marcelo is not very different from Américo Tomás, warns Ventura

Presidential candidate criticizes current president when talking about maternity wards. Decision on posters left him “revolted”.

Andre Ventura I was in a street in Vendas Novas, this Monday, when I heard a local resident complaining that his daughter, who is about to give birth, doesn’t have a maternity ward close to home.

“We cannot continue to have maternity hospital closuresor spaces with kilometers and kilometers without a single maternity ward”, Ventura began by saying.

The candidate for President of the Republic also lamented that, even in district capitals, there are maternity wards closed on weekends or “out of hours”.

And blames Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa: “In fact, it was the president himself who wanted to become a decorative jar, because he was guaranteed re-election: if he doesn’t do anything he doesn’t bother anyone, he just says banalities and holds inaugurations.”

“Become a ribbon cutter. It’s not very different from what Américo Tomás was during the Estado Novo”, said André Ventura.

The posters

The Civil Court of Lisbon refused André Ventura’s request for suspension, which targeted the gypsy community, a decision that the candidate considered unfair but which he said he will accept.

The Court, in a decision sent to journalists by Chega’s official source, rejected the request for a suspensive effect on the removal of posters pending a decision on appeal, following a request made by André Ventura.

Judge Ana Barão considered that the presidential candidate has the right to appeal the decision, but that he cannot request the suspensive effect, which is only attributed to certain actions provided for in the Code of Civil Procedure – not covered by this case.

Furthermore, the judge maintains, the presidential candidate does not explain how the removal of the posters will cause him “serious and repairable harm” and did not offer to provide a deposit, in addition to the fact that, in his opinion, the right to a good name, image and reputation must prevail, in a context in which André Ventura’s right to run the electoral campaign “continues to be assured”.

The judge of the Civil Court of Lisbon considered that André Ventura “cannot fail to know that his conviction is based on discriminatory ideas and attacks an ethnic minority”, in addition to worsening “the stigma and prejudice that gypsy communities are already targets of in Portuguese society in general, thus fomenting intolerance, segregation, discrimination and, ultimately, hatred”.

“I’m outraged, I’m outraged and I think it’s a bad day for the rule of law in Portugal and I don’t think it should be like that”, reacted Ventura, upon arrival in Vendas Novas.

The president of Chega also considered, in statements to journalists, that the refusal of the suspensive effect of the decision is “unfair” and “regrettable”.

“It’s a decision wrong”, he stressed, criticizing the court for considering that the candidate cannot wait for the appeal to remove the posters.

André Ventura said that “I would do exactly the same thing again and putting up posters [a dizer] that the Gypsies have to obey the law”.

The presidential candidate also stated that he will accept the decisionstating that today he indicated that all posters targeting the gypsy community should be removed, without clarifying how many are still posted and in which districts.