The disgraceful story of a Ukrainian job-seeker beaten to death by airport inspectors in March 2020 is once again back in the news, because an indemnity promised to his daughter by the now Minister for Interior Administration is not being honoured.
Minister Maria Lúcia Amaral announced the indemnity in her almost eight-year capacity as Portugal’s Ombudsman. It was to come in the form of a yearly payment of €3,375 to support Veronika Homeniuk in her studies – and it was due to have started being paid at the beginning of this year, says Expresso.
Bringing this story today, the paper recalls that the payments were conceived to come out of the SEF budget (the now extinct ‘Serviços de Estrangeiros e Fronteiras’, for which the inspectors who beat Veronika’s father to death were working at the time).
“With the extinction of this police force two years ago, the case (ergo, the responsibility for payment) passes to the Ministry for Internal Administration”, says the paper – the ministry where Maria Lúcia Amaral is now (conveniently) the minister in charge.
Much was paid of the compensation awarded to the family of Ihor Homeniuk – but it is looking today as if a lot of the ‘announcements’ were hot air.
José Gaspar Schwalbach, the lawyer that has represented the family throughout this hideous ordeal, tells Expresso that he has pressed “various state entities” to try and get Veronika the ‘justice’ she was awarded.
“Unfortunately, in spite of the several requests sent to the Ombudsman, the Ministry, the office of the prime minister and to the minister of the presidency (…) none of the entities seem to want to give us an answer”, he tells Expresso – reiterating that we are dealing here with a 19-year-old girl who lost her father while he was ‘in the care of the Portuguese state’.
Veronika is now attending the Lviv Faculty of Pharmacy in Ukraine. All the probatory documents have been delivered by the head of the faculty: the young woman is indeed trying to further her education (as the compensation pledged by Portugal was for), but for reasons completely unclear the Portuguese government is refusing to pay, “without any justification, and without showing any concern for the situation”, says Schwalbach.
“With the silence of the government, and the Minister, we all lose: in security, in confidence in the institutions and in the representatives elected to protect us”, the lawyer considers.
Expresso says that it has contacted the Ministry of Interior Administration in a bid to try and understand “at what stage this process is. But up until time of printing (last night) there was no response”.
Source: Expresso
