CHEGA MP Francisco Gomes claims members of the notorious Brazilian mafia, Primeiro Comando Capital (PCC), have infiltrated the workforce at Lisbon Airport.
In a ‘dramatic video clip’ posted over social media, Gomes suggests his party has received information that these individuals have infiltrated teams working within the airport infrastructure, including in services supporting runway and terminal operations.
There is a lot of gesticulating and animation in the clip, but the message may carry more than a grain of truth, bearing in mind warnings given by Brazilian prosecutor Lincoln Gakiya, and security expert Roberto Uchôa a few months ago – who both stressed the level of PCC infiltration in Portugal.
PCC is known as one of Brazil’s largest criminal organisations, associated with drug trafficking, organised crime and violence.
According to Gomes, PCC members are hired through employment agencies (that presumably have no knowledge of their criminal connections). These workers have “already been caught by other staff misplacing luggage, stealing passengers’ belongings” and committing other irregularities, says Gomes – albeit such incidents have not been reported due to alleged threats made against staff who have witnessed them, and “against their family members, vehicles and personal property.”
Gomes concludes that if his information is correct, Portugal is facing criminal infiltration at one of its principal points of entry into the country, “with direct implications to the security of airport operations (…) We are not talking about little misdemeanours,” he adds. “We are talking of a global group linked to drug trafficking and organised crime, operating within a critical infrastructure of this country. This puts the whole of Portugal at risk, and those in charge cannot ignore it, or hide from reality.”
The fact that this warning comes from CHEGA – a populist political party that even had one of its own MPs caught stealing people’s luggage from airport carousels – needs to be factored into this story. But the probability of PCC members working at the airport is not beyond the bounds of reason – bearing in mind the information given by Brazilian law enforcement last summer, and the fact that the group has already been found active at some of the country’s ports.
Source material: Diário de Notícias de Madeira/ SAPO/ Facebook
