With old government still in office…
In what observers may see as an incongruous event, Portugal’s new parliament has met for the first time today, with the ‘old’ PS majority still in effective office.
Luís Montenegro’s ‘relative majority’ AD (democratic alliance) will not be officially sworn in until next week (on April 2).
Today’s fixture is more to start the wheels turning: see the new president of the House elected (later this afternoon), as well as vice-presidents and secretaries, and in some cases, to see new plaques screwed into place (like the one indicating the return of CDS-PP, a party that lost its representation in the 2022 elections).
Portugal’s new look parliament now has NINE parties represented (one more than before): PSD (78 MPs), PS (78 MPs), CHEGA (50 MPs), Iniciativa Liberal (8 MPs), Bloco de Esquerda (5 MPs), LIVRE (4), CDU (PCP communists – 4 MPs), CDS-PP (2) and PAN (1) – a total of 230 MPs, 99 of which are ‘first-timers’.
Also for the first time, MPs will be required to sign a term of office, in which they solemnly affirm that they will faithfully perform the duties in which they are invested and defend, comply with and enforce the Constitution of the Portuguese Republic.
And next week, this new government will become the first to have its members ‘pass’ a 36-point questionnaire brought in by PS Socialists following a succession of ‘inconvenient scandals’ in which government members were appointed without due diligence.
Source material: LUSA
