Path to 2025 State Budget looks narrower
The Government scheduled a new round of negotiations with the parliamentary opposition for next Tuesday.
As PORTUGAL DECODED reported a few weeks ago, September started with political temperatures rising over the 2025 State Budget.
On Friday, Chega’s President, André Ventura, announced the party’s withdrawal from the negotiations, saying that “in all likelihood it will vote against” the document.
“Chega will stay out of approving the budget and will continue to do the job of leading the opposition (i.e., he’s taking a jibe at the Socialists, since they, and not Chega, are the second most voted party and therefore the leaders of the opposition),” he said.
“Nothing will make me change my mind,” emphasised André Ventura.
He added that the party “has been betrayed by the Prime Minister” because of what he considers to be the negotiations that have been going on “for months” between the Government and the Socialist Partido Socialista (PS).
“Chega is fed up with being deceived,” André Ventura lamented, recalling the assurances he says were given to him by Luís Montenegro's executive. “What the Government told us was that there were no negotiations with the PS. The Government lied to Chega and to Portugal,’ he accused.
“I really hope that the secret negotiations between the PS and PSD bear fruit. They will at least guarantee that there won't be a new political crisis in the coming months,” he said.
PM claims popular support
On Sunday, PM Luís Montenegro said that the opposition parties is disorientated and “full of the ghosts” about the State Budget.
“My conviction is that, at the moment, the country is with the Government (i.e., he’s bragging that the Government will come out victorious in the event an early election). What we don’t know is whether the opposition will be with the country,’ said the PM.
He insisted that the Government doesn’t want early elections and doesn’t need them to govern the country.
Montenegro guaranteed that the instability is not in the Government’s, but on the opposition’s side.
“The leader of Chega feels spiteful because he saw a news report - which incidentally isn’t true - and concluded that there had been negotiations between PS and PSD during August and then, in an immature and rash way, says ‘I don’t want anything to do with the budget’,’ he accused.
About Socialist Party leader he said: “He feels spiteful because, during the month of August, nobody said anything to him. No, that’s not what was agreed. It’s 1 September. We’re on time, on time and on time to talk to the political parties and finalise the proposed State Budget. Where do these ghosts come from, where does so much disorientation come from?” he asked.
Socialist red lines
Later on Sunday, it was the Socialist’s turn to have their say.
Speaking at the Socialists’ annual summer meet-up, leader Pedro Nuno Santos said that the party will never approve a budget bill that includes the Government’s proposals to lower the corporate income tax and personal income tax.
These measures, he considered, show that the Democratic Alliance (AD) executive “governs for a minority”.
He said: “(…) how can we remain silent in the face of a Government that wants to lower corporate income tax across the board and without criteria for all companies?”.
He accused the Government of “giving up 1500 million euros a year” to benefit a “small number of large companies”.
“How can we remain silent in the face of a Government that wants to implement two different personal income tax regimes in Portugal, creating injustices?” he continued.
Moreover, he stressed that if these proposals pass with the Liberals’ and Chega’s support, “then it is with these parties that the State Budget must also be approved”.
However, Pedro Nuno Santos made ‘clear’ that, if the Budget is not approved, the PS is available to ‘approve an amending budget’ that guarantees that the agreements made between the executive and public administration professionals are honoured.
President is still optimistic
Meanwhile, President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa said that he is convinced that the State Budget for 2025 will be approved, saying that he trusts in “common sense” at a “decisive moment” and because “it’s what the Portuguese want”.
“If you ask the Portuguese if they want a political crisis in a month and a half or two, I think that if there was a vote on it, the overwhelming majority would say no,” he said.
Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa stressed the need to reach a consensus: “With the situation in the world, with the unpredictability, starting with the American election, but also the beginning of a new European cycle, with the wars that continue, with the lack of clarity on economic decision-making, including in the major European economies that aren’t growing and recovering, I don't believe that anyone would shy away from dialogue in order to reach a budget.”
“For months now, I’ve been reminding people that it's obvious that the Portuguese want there to be no political crisis in October or November of this year,” he repeated.
The plot thickens.