Filipe Amorim / LUSA
António Leitão Amaro’s announcement that the location of the Ministry of Internal Administration would remain the same delayed the entire process
The initial location had to be aborted due to the Government’s decision to maintain the Ministry of Administration in Terreiro do Paço. There are also delays in the release of financing that put initial deadlines at risk.
The project to create the 25th of April Interpretive Centerpresented as one of the main legacies of the celebrations of the 50th anniversary of the revolution, is currently located blocked due to lack of government decision regarding the space and financing needed to carry it out.
Announced in January 2024, the equipment should be inaugurated by 2026, in Lisbon, but, to date, There is no timetable for the start of worksnor definitive location defined. The initial proposal envisaged the installation of the center in the east wing of Terreiro do Paço, on the premises of the Ministry of Internal Administration (MAI), which would be vacated. However, this solution became unfeasible after the change of Government, says .
The protocol signed between the Associação 25 de Abril, the Lisbon City Council and the previous Executive, led by António Costa, established that the State should provide the space and finance the project, which had a budget of around 5.2 million euros. With the entry into office of the Government of Luís Montenegro, the plan came to an impasse, after the Minister of the Presidency, Leitão Amaro, announced that the MAI would not be transferred, making the initial location unfeasible.
Although an alternative was suggested at the Ministry of Agriculture facilities, this hypothesis was never formalized and, even if progress is made, it should not come to fruition before 2027. Since then, there have been no relevant developments, which compromises the objective of inaugurating the center within the scope of the official celebrations, which end in December this year.
Also at the financial level there was no progress. The agreement provided for the transfer of 10% of the budget in 2024 for the development of technical projects, funds that were never made available. As a consequence, the studies carried out for the initially planned space lost their usefulness.
In an attempt to unblock the situation, prosecutors recently met with the President of the Republic, António José Seguro, who pledged to intercede with the Government to speed up the process.
