André Ventura is the leader of the Portuguese Nationalist Party shiga (That’s enough) which includes 12 deputies. was a candidate for 2021 Portuguese presidential election He received nearly 12% of the vote. Lionel Baland met him for Breizh-info.
Breizh-info: Your party made electoral progress in Portugal when it wasn’t at all obvious at first. How do you explain this result?
Andrew Ventura: Yes, a lot of people thought that wouldn’t happen. We are now the third party in Portugal after the Socialists and the Social Democrats and we hope to become the second very quickly.
The reason for this success is that the population is not happy. She is angry about various things that have happened in the last decade in Portugal: corruption, low wages compared to other countries, and economic conditions. The Portuguese are aware that the countries of Eastern Europe, which joined the EU much later than Portugal, are experiencing faster and stronger economic growth than the latter. The people hold the parties of the system, the socialists and the social democrats who alternately led the successive governments, for this situation. People want real change and that explains why Chega influences people so well and grows so much.
Breizh-info: Does Portugal have an immigration problem?
Andrew Ventura: We have one, but it, for example, cannot be compared with the one that France experienced. We have moved from the country of immigration, which we have been for decades, to the country of immigration.
We are not against all immigrants and immigrants. We want people who come to work, pay their taxes, participate in our common lives, don’t destroy our culture, and live off Social Security benefits from the state and taxpayers.
Threats exist. Thus, last year Portugal was the second country in the world to grant citizenship to foreigners. it’s a problem. Nowadays Portugal receives thousands of people, now more people from Ukraine and other Eastern European countries. We must be smart and discuss how to welcome them in order to have a society that lives in harmony and not in conflict between societies, made up of minorities on the one hand and the majority of the population on the other.
[…]The full article is at Preezh Info
