The President of the Portuguese Parliament reprimanded the extreme right for the attack on Lula: “Enough shame on Portugal”

It was not a holiday atmosphere like any other year. It seemed that the climate of tension and political polarization was waiting for this April 25 for a big confrontation. The chosen excuse was the president of Brazil, Lula da Silvawho was invited by the Government to give a speech before the Parliament on the occasion of official memorial days 49th anniversary of the Carnation Revolution. It was unprecedented in Portuguese democracy for a foreign leader to address the Assembly of the Republic on such an important date, and his invitation was a prerogative that did not correspond to the Government, but to the Chamber.

These two formalities served the right, led by Chega’s radicals, to demand the elimination of Brazil’s intervention, to which the socialists responded with another formality: they will not speak during, but before the start of the official program, in the welcome appeal. representatives.

His speech overshadowed everything that surrounded him, from the preventive police mega-action to signs “thief” and the Ukrainian flag which he showed Chega while most of the hall erupted in applause. If the brand is already historical, the answer of Parliament Speaker Augusto Santos Silva was no less emblematic: “Enough insults and disgrace to the name of Portugal”.

“With you, Brazil opens up to the world again”Santos Silva received the Brazilian, praising the ties between the two countries and Lula’s democratic and social vision. In his speech, he highlighted the “hope” that April 25 meant for Brazilians and stressed the need to continue to fight against “extremist ideologies driven by the dictatorship of algorithms” that “spread hatred.”

A victim of his criticism of NATO in Beijing, the Brazilian president repeated: “We condemn the territorial violation of Ukraine and we believe in the international order based on the right to respect and national sovereignty”, after which he asked for the reconfiguration of the Security Council from the ONU. In this regard, he recalled that on April 25, he not only charted a “course towards democracy”, but also ended “the end of colonial power”.

It is actually that Lula’s presence symbolized an act of fraternization with the colonies, with a legitimate leader elected by a people with its own autonomy. It is also Portugal’s reconciliation with its past, in which decolonization played an essential role, as therapy for modernization. That fight, 49 years ago, is still a source of pride for a country that believes it has earned its rights. This is why it is demanding: 43% of Portuguese citizens are dissatisfied with the state of democracy today, according to the latest research.