Presidential candidate Luís Marques Mendes considered this Sunday that his opponent André Ventura “cannot be President of the Republic and will not be”, accusing him of “dividing the Portuguese” and “undermining democracy”.
On the sidelines of a visit to Feira de Santa Iria, in Tomar, in the district of Santarém, the former PSD leader considered the statements made by Chega’s president in an interview with SIC to be “simply regrettable”, in which he argued that Portugal needed “three Salazars”.
“The country needs a President who unites the Portuguese. This man is here to turn them against each other”, maintained Marques Mendes.
The former PSD leader and candidate for Belém stressed that the country requires a head of state who defends democracy and mutual respect.
“This man doesn’t respect anything or anyone, as we saw in this recent interview. In a word: this man will not be, nor can he be, President of the Republic”, he highlighted.
The former social democratic leader said that, unlike André Ventura, he wants to “defend respect for each other and for each other’s ideas”.
“He wants to divide the Portuguese, I want to unite. He wants to undermine and even destroy democracy. I want to reinforce the quality of our democracy. That’s what a President of the Republic should do. They are completely opposite camps and that’s why I say that this man cannot be President of the Republic, nor will he be President of the Republic, because this is not what the Portuguese want from a President of the Republic”, he maintained.
Marques Mendes also said that the president of Chega “wants to be Prime Minister” and not President of the Republic, intending with his candidacy for Belém to “create noise, confusion and provocation”.
“He only knows how to live based on noise, confusion and provocation. That’s why a person like that cannot be President of the Republic, nor will he be President of the Republic”, he added.
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