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The President of the Republic made a brief statement to the country to affirm that he decreed a state of emergency “that reconciles the protection of life and health” with “the protection of wages and employment of workers and entrepreneurs of micro, small and medium businesses “.
Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa said that the “very limited scope” of this declaration of a second state of emergency stems from “lessons learned from what has not gone well in the past,” but did not explain what he was referring to.
In less than 10 minutes, the Head of State highlighted, yes, the “broad convergence” of this statement between the President, Parliament, the Government and the social partners, and the “parliamentary majority of 84% in favor and 94% who did not oppose ”, Referring here to the abstentions of BE and PAN. In his opinion, this vast majority is “a portrait of the Portuguese who must continue the effort” to contain the pandemic.
Regarding the content of the decree, Marcelo highlighted the aspects to which they refer: better response of health structures, the possibility of expanding screening and temperature measurement with the participation of other professionals, as well as the military, but also the possibility of limit circulation to certain hours and in certain regions ”, which includes a possible curfew.
When referring to the possibility of requesting services and goods from the private, social and cooperative health sector, Marcelo stressed that it is a matter of allowing “greater articulation, preferably by agreement and always with fair compensation”, thus eliminating the unilateral civil requisition by the state. Later, he even affirmed his confidence that “together we will do everything possible to respond to both covid and non-covid patients”, because “the objective is to guarantee all legitimate rights to life and health”.
The President also clarified that this second state of emergency declared for 15 days will be re-evaluated at the end of the month “in its existence, scope and content”, and may be extended due to the evolution of the pandemic, which, however, “does not end in the coming months. “But he considered that” November will be an essential test “to avoid” an aggravated December, with aggravated and undesirable restrictions. “A different reference to Christmas that Marcelo and António Costa have been defending.
But he appealed to the “restraint, serenity and resistance” of the Portuguese, also left a clear warning to the Government about the need for “a commitment to accelerate, with work and humility, investment in the Health sector in the State Budgets for 2021 ”. This was the demand made by several parties, in particular the Left Bloc, in the parliamentary debate where the declaration of the state of emergency was authorized. And the Government’s response may depend not only on the renewal of this exceptional situation, but also on the parliamentary viability of the Budget.
