There are days left for the budget mystery to end and the siege around the PS to tighten. In the party itself, doubts are multiplying, from top to bottom, about whether the socialist message on the State Budget is transmitted clearly. And, with André Ventura announcing that he will effectively vote against the document, the pressure – from which the party is trying to free itself, clinging to the inconsistencies and contradictions of leader Chega – is greater than ever.

Despite the varied and contradictory announcements that André Ventura has been making about his vote in the State Budget, the conviction that he would be out of the game has increased since he publicly accused the Prime Minister of “lying.” This Tuesday, Ventura appeared to confirm that the party’s vote will indeed be againstthis time without conditions or reservations attached, which seems to confirm that the PS is definitely only in the budgetary sphere with the PSD.

In the PS, the order is one: the leadership, aware that there is some confusion about the evolution of its position regarding the Budget, wants to maintain the idea that it has “its moment to make a decision” and clings to the inconsistencies of Ventura to take off the pressure you feel on yourself. “More right-wing soap operas are not bad for the PS,” says a deputy to the Observer. “Is this to be believed or will you change your mind tomorrow?” jokes a leader. “I still think he might bite the bullet,” adds another.

But, beyond the supposed staging, the PS is aware that it appears publicly more and more. surrounded. Because even if the decision – which Pedro Nuno Santos, as the Observer said, will propose to the National Political Commission of the PS next Monday – is not the result of Chega’s position, the consequence is inevitable: “It is very clear that consequence of the PS vote.”

In other words, believing that Chega is out of the game, if a political crisis occurs, it is likely to be seen as a “direct consequence” of the PS decision – and this is not a factor that is out of the equation. . The socialists have been commenting for months that they would feel more comfortable if Chega guaranteed viability and therefore they were free to vote on the Budget as they saw fit, without threats of a political crisis hanging in the air. That comfort zone seems to be gone forever.

Pedro Nuño tried to have “a single voice”, but the party reacted badly

For this reason, it is urgent to refine and solidify more and more the message that the PS wants to convey regarding this Budget, and which it fears is not being clear. Over the weekend, that effort was evident. And if Pedro Nuno Santos’ attempt to clarify what the PS thinks about this Budget is welcome for the party, the way in which he tried to extend this clarification to television commentators with militant cards, who advised them to “get off the pedestal”, contacting grassroots activists and not playing “the right-wing game” – was far from pleasing everyone.

“He went a little further on the internal issue,” admits a prominent socialist leader in statements to the Observer on condition of anonymity. One pedronunista goes even further: the call to the PS to speak with “one voice” was “a mistake”and it is really an expression”inadmissible“.

For the current less favorable to Pedro Nuno Santos, the criticism was obvious: it did not take long until the former minister José Antonio Vieira da Silva came to say “thunderstruck” with the idea of ​​a single voice, which he said was not “typical of a democracy”; also former minister Campos Correia spoke in a “blatant error”by the secretary general; and in the Whatsapps of socialists less supportive of Pedrounism (or commentators) it was commented that the party “reacts badly” to these calls.

“The PS is a party of men and women free and also responsible,” he highlighted this Monday Jose Luis Carneiroopponent of Pedro Nuno Santos in the race for the leadership of the PS, while ensuring that he does not feel limited in his public statements after the leader’s warning. “It was a moment less happy“added Francisco Assis, to Público.

But the concern at the top of the party is different: the controversy surrounding Pedro Nuño’s message to socialist commentators diverts attention from the message, a message that the party has tried to build, in the midst of many advances and setbacks, and that now he wants to approve. to put an end to the idea that one does not know what to do with the State Budget. “The position of the PS is not clear“admits a prominent socialist. “Those who do not follow politics do not understand it.”

“A doubt and a uncertainty in public perception, in contrast to the clear perception of the progress made by the PS in previous weeks,” says a former socialist government official, underlining that extending the decision can have its advantages, since it conditions the Government in a possible discussion. on the subject and avoiding a barrage of criticism during the PSD congress, which will take place next weekend.

But this maneuver also has disadvantages clear, and that for many surpass the first: “A time of apparent uncertainty and division”within the party. HE division It has been clear in the socialist meetings, whether in the district federations or in the bench of deputies. And it extends not only to the decision that the party must make regarding the Budget, but also to the way in which it must be made.

In the party leadership there are those who ask that speculation be put to an end and that the decision-making process of the PS be respected, without “dramas“. And there are those who explain the debacle of Pedro Nuno Santos, emphasizing that in this phase of meetings and hearings “all opinions are welcome”, but, when the matter is discussed outside the borders of Largo do Rato, the party should “strengthen the position of the secretary general”, instead of trying to “publicly condition” the decision he will make.

“The leader must have his time, he must have his method, he must have his learning. We want to give you lessons through a comment or a RAID means, it does not seem prudent to me,” warned former director Ascenso Simões, in a message posted on his Facebook. In this case there is no consensus in the PS either.

PS tries to “demonstrate” its distance from the PSD

Thanks to these hesitations and disagreements on various fronts, there were sighs of relief upon hearing the socialist leader define an anti-rights script that would also work if the document were viable. “Porto’s speech went a little further regarding the internal issue. In the rest, buzz the Government or the Budget is what the PS should do, regardless of the electoral orientation that is adopted,” argues a leader already mentioned.

In other words, the PS must be unmarked as much as possible from the document so that no traces remain. confusions about whether the Budget is even similar to those designed in the last years of the socialist government – an idea that many commentators, but even parties like the Liberal Initiative, have emphasized – or about whether the PS will renounce the leadership of the opposition even if it achieves the document.

That’s why Pedro Nuño Santos dedicated the weekend to ‘working’ on the right and the Budget, and his followers liked it, and regretted that the message to the commentators could take away the momentum from the script that the PS wants to establish. “He gave the best speech he has ever given as an opposition leader,” comments one leader, arguing that the socialist is usually stronger in “doctrinal and ideological” speeches and that he is now more concentrated by showing what differentiates it from the PSD, inside and outside the budget, “something that the PS has not been able to do due to this process,” admits the same source.

“He is trying to show that the Budget is not from the PS, distancing himself regardless of the result. You need to send a message. opposition — either by adopting the pedagogy of voting against, or by demonstrating that the PS will make it viable in favor of political stability and not any rapprochement with the PSD,” we hear from the socialist leadership.

There is awareness that the PS has been tangled in the negotiations with the Social Democrats and that the narrative about each gain or loss in relation to one of its red lines (or the other priorities it has introduced in the meantime) is difficult to follow and assimilate, it is important to explain that if the PS decides to leave that the Budget does so for a matter of national interest. The reason must be distant and there can never be any suggestion that he did it because there were some common points expressed in the document.

With the meeting of the National Political Commission, the body to which Pedro Nuno Santos will take his voting proposal on the OE, scheduled for Monday, according to the Observer, the PS is trying to consolidate its discourse around the inadequacies of the State budget. , for whatever comes. And trying to change things batteries For Luis Montenegro.

“Montenegro has to explain why it closed the process without an agreement from the PS. There’s no need? Don’t you want it? Do you have another formula to approve it? Are you sure that the PS will make it possible? The prime minister should know this, because he has confidence,” they say from the PS. The game is about pressure. And the countdown to the end of the budget stakes is about to begin.

Pedro Nuño with the bench divided, but the circle closest to the leader wants to vote against