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Nine months after the death of a Ukrainian citizen at the Lisbon Airport Temporary Installation Center, and now after the Prosecutor’s Office has indicted three inspectors from the Foreigners and Borders Service, the Government is studying the fate of this service. security and the strongest hypothesis is that the SEF ceases to be a police force and becomes a purely administrative entity.
The information was initially released this Saturday by TVI and the Observer confirmed to the Government that it is a hypothesis on the table. The final model will only be known in the coming weeks, but the possibility of transforming the SEF – formally a police force – into an administrative entity dealing with visas, residence permits and asylum applications is being seriously considered.
The plan to restructure the SEF, by the way, is old enough, but the Lisbon airport case may have precipitated the decision. In the Government program, the Socialist Executive has already committed to “reconfigure the way in which public services deal with the phenomenon of immigration, adopting an approach more humanistic and less bureaucratic ”.
El Observador, an official source from the Ministry of the Interior, did not confirm the information, referring simply to the statement announcing the dismissal of Cristina Gatões, now former director of the SEF. Could read: “[O Governo vai] to establish a organic separation very clear between the police functions and the administrative functions of authorization and documentation of immigrants ”.
Later, the same Ministry announced that it would start “work together immediately between the Security Forces and Services to redefine the exercise of police functions on border management and the fight against human trafficking networks “.
According to TVI, the border control would pass to the PSP and the investigation to the PJ, integrating the approximately 1,000 inspectors of that force to other policemen.
Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa: “If it is a systematic action, the SEF itself is at stake”
The case at the airport in March, about a week after the state of emergency was declared in the country due to the Covid-19 pandemic, resulted in prosecution by the Public Ministry on September 30. But it was the interview with the director Cristina Gatões, who this week was dismissed from her position, admitting that what happened in that center was a case of torture, which brought the case back to the media. The resignation of the director led some parties to request the resignation of Eduardo Cabrita, Minister of Internal Administration, and with Prime Minister António Costa himself going so far as to say that he had not lost confidence in his minister.
This week the MAI also decided to compensate the family of the victim, whose widow gave an interview to SIC saying that she had not received anything from the Portuguese state and that the Ukrainian government paid her only 100 euros per month, insufficient due to the lack of her husband and from both. dependent children.
President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa also made the comment on the case public, saying flatly that if the SEF does not work, “it must be replaced.” In an interview with SIC, he explained how it would work: “Transferring the powers of the SEF in border control to other police entities.”
“This is for no one to see.” The 56 hours that led to the death of a Ukrainian at Lisbon airport
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