Candidate Luís Marques Mendes lays into rival for post, former Navy chief
With one election done (albeit far from dusted), Portugal is being launched into a new election race – that for the presidency of the Republic, coming up in the New Year.
Before that there are the municipal elections. But ‘seizing the moment’ yesterday, declared candidate for the presidency, former PSD president and renowned political commentator Luís Marques Mendes, went for the jugular.
The possible election of Admiral Henrique Gouveia e Melo “could be a huge risk” and “a danger to democracy”, he told Antena 1’s political podcast “Política com Assinatura”.
In Marques Mendes’ opinion “we know almost nothing about Gouveia Melo’s position on any issue. And on the few issues we do know about, he has expressed at least two opinions on the same matter…
“Therefore, I would even say that, since he is now finally – and it was about time – a candidate, I think he can and should start giving explanations on issues,” namely, the recent “defeat” in court relating to his and the Navy’s treatment of sailors who ‘led a mutiny’ because they feared for their safety in a trouble-beset coastal patrol boat.
As Luís Marques Mendes pointed out, “the court said that Gouveia e Melo, as Chief of Staff of the Navy (CEMA), did not act properly.”
The Supreme Administrative Court (STA) released a ruling earlier this month declaring that the sanctions imposed by the Navy on NRP Mondego military personnel following ‘a failed mission in 2023’ were unlawful. In so doing, the court dismissed the appeal by the Navy, which contested an earlier decision in their same vein by the Southern Central Administrative Court (TCA).
The STA considered the Navy’s disciplinary sanctions, when Gouveia e Melo was its Chief of Staff, contained several flaws and shortcomings, which resulted in the “nullity of the disciplinary sanction due to procedural flaws”.
At the time Gouveia e Melo travelled to the island of Madeira, where the patrol ship Mondego was docked, to give the ‘Mondego mutineers’ a very public dressing down.
Much later it emerged that his fury stemmed from the fact that the Mondego had been tasked with accompanying a Russian spy ship as it sailed through Portuguese waters. But by then the Mondego has spectacularly broken down mid-mission from Funchal to the Selvagens islands, requiring the ignominy of being towed back to base.
In other words, the boat’s parlous state of seaworthiness was made crystal clear, in spite of all the Navy’s protestations that boats in its service were able to function even with technical anomalies.
But fast-forwarding back to this Antena 1 podcast, Marques Mendes’ attack shows there is to be no let up in political machinations this year: the country will have to endure the cacophony of municipal electoral campaigns throughout the summer, and then the presidential campaign will become ‘super serious’.
The ‘problem’ for the establishment (meaning political parties) is that they are not used to a candidate for the presidency from ‘outside’ of their coteries – particularly such a ‘Dark Horse’ from the military, a man who ostensibly knows a lot of the secrets and will be expected to keep them.
Normally, such a candidate would not pose much in the way of concern. But in Gouveia e Melo’s case, he does: he rose to international acclaim during the Covid pandemic, and is recognised for having pulled the Navy into the 21st century. Pundits said months ago, that if Gouveia e Melo stood for the presidency, he “will be unbeatable” – and this is what is worrying the establishment, which Luís Marques Mendes very much personifies. ND
