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Almost nine months after closing the doors for the measures against the covid-19 pandemic, the discos are silent and the businessmen challenged by the prime minister to reinvent themselves are tired and say they are betrayed by the new measures, that is, the That force restaurants close at 1pm on weekends.
Today, they brought the shouts of revolt to Rossio, in Lisbon, where the music always played the same key: “Help us. We are slowly dying ”.
“We were completely forgotten. We live in a state of law, we have obligations and duties, but we also have rights ”, said businessman Samuel Lopes, owner of a restaurant and nightclub in Lisbon, to the Lusa agency, which today led to the demonstration of the revolt of the businessmen of this sector.
Samuel Lopes was one of those who “reinvented” his business, but he still has the nightclub closed and now he can’t open the restaurant for the weekend.
“We have not been able to work at the disco for nine months. The Government encouraged us to reinvent our business and I was one of those who succeeded and now they close us? “, Lament.
According to Samuel Lopes, more and more cases of families resent the lack of employment in this sector, which involves a vast menu of professions: cooks, waiters, porters, DJs, cleaning personnel.
“No matter how much math we do, we can’t. Our margin is very small, because we pay a lot of taxes, ”he said.
And those who cannot overcome the difficulties succumb, sometimes at the cost of their own lives, and reports of suicides in this area are becoming more frequent.
Fear and uncertainty have taken their toll on the mental health of professionals in this sector. “We are lost, they are sleepless nights, we try to help each other, but it is difficult, we cannot reach all the doors, we also need bread for our family.”
In a protest marked by forceful phrases, spiced with many bad words, there was a moment dedicated to those who lost their jobs in these areas and, mainly, to those who allegedly committed suicide, with a minute of silence accompanied by black and red smoke, released from torches held by promoters of the event.
The restaurant sector was strongly represented at the rally, with chef Ljubomir Stanisic asking for help so that the restaurant could “continue to help the government.”
“This is getting out of control. There are already 43,000 people on the street. We are obliged to fire people and we do not want to, ”he told reporters at the end of the event, which was closely watched by the police.
And on the support announced by the Government of 20% of the break in the turnover registered in the first nine months of this year, in relation to the same period of 2019, the cook described them as “false perspectives”.
This is because, since January, the restaurants have been operating 50% of the occupation and, of those 44 weeks, 11 were closed.
“We only want our rights, we want to help the Government as we have helped until now. But, for the love of God, look at us, we are literally dying little by little. “
Among the various measures that these businessmen demand from the Government, and which are contained in a manifesto read at the beginning of the protest, are “non-reimbursable economic support to compensate for the losses accumulated in eight months for the sector of bars and discos, events , catering, commerce and all direct and indirect suppliers ”.
It also requires “Support for the restoration and commerce for reduced hours” and “replacement of opening hours of restaurants, bars and commercial premises”, as well as the exemption of the Single Social Tax (TSU) until June 30, 2021, reduction of the VAT rate until December 31, 2021 and aid for the payment of income.
Although there were no cuts in her salary, Thiene, a Portuguese-Brazilian woman living in Portugal for four years, joined the protest because she knows “people who have been declared bankrupt in their business.”
“If I did not think about others, I would be at home calmly, because my salary continues to arrive correctly, but I do not live in a bubble. I know there are people in need. We are one, ”he told Lusa.
Thiene considers that the Government is not betting on the main source of contagion, which is the homes, regretting that these are being left behind, like concentration camps.
And he has no doubts: “Now, this will only change when it is the people against the state.”
There was still time for music and dancing at the event, and the participants showed in this way that they already miss the clubs with their doors open.
A moment of relaxation that preceded another in which spirits rose after one of the speakers criticized the way in which a journalist from the online newspaper Observador reported on the number of participants in the meeting.
The police even had to prevent the passage of some of the protesters, who took advantage of the incident to criticize the media, calling the journalists present liars.
As it had begun, the meeting ended with the sound of the national anthem, although the music could still be heard for some time, while the protesters dispersed, on the first weekend with a curfew starting at 1:00 p.m.
For his part, the Minister of Economy announced today that the support already made available or announced for the catering sector as a result of the crisis caused by the pandemic amounts to 1,103 million euros, which corresponds to about 60% of the breakdown of billing registered by the sector.
The covid-19 pandemic in Portugal killed 3,305 people of the 211,266 infected with the new coronavirus.
Globally, it caused at least 1,305,039 deaths as a result of more than 53.4 million cases of infection worldwide, according to a report by the French agency AFP.
The disease is transmitted by a new coronavirus detected at the end of December 2019 in Wuhan, a city in central China.
