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The Minister of Finance attributes responsibility to the Socialist Party for making the 2025 State Budget viable, and goes on to state that he believes the country will have a current budget in January. The country “has to live on a budget,” highlights Joaquim Miranda Sarmento, in an interview with SIC Notícias, without assuming that it will not live in twelfths and that in a scenario of non-approval the Government will resign as it did in a previous interview with Público . In that case, he said this Wednesday, “we will make our decision.”
But he stressed that “the important thing is that the country can start the year with a budget.” And he puts all the weight on the PS, reinforcing the word responsibility to define the steps that the socialists must take. “The PS has to decide whether it is responsible or not,” leaving, however, on the table that “we do not have much room to negotiate.”
But “if the PS believes that it still has something to propose, we will listen to it, but now the responsibility lies with the PS.”
“I am convinced that the PS will have the responsibility of not bringing the country back into a crisis at a difficult international moment and that we have to execute the PRR and we have a good budget for the country,” says Miranda Sarmento, who says that in In these negotiations, the Government went beyond half the bridge to reach an agreement.
[Já saiu o terceiro episódio de “A Grande Provocadora”, o novo podcast Plus do Observador que conta a história de Vera Lagoa, a mulher que afrontou Salazar, desafiou os militares de Abril e ridicularizou os que se achavam donos do país. Pode ouvir aqui, no Observador, e também na Apple Podcasts, no Spotify e no Youtube. E pode ouvir aqui o primeiro episódio e aqui o segundo.]
The Budget becomes viable if the PS abstains (or votes in favor) or if Chega votes in favor. And, for this reason, Miranda Sarmento says that “PS and Chega are in what economists define as the prisoner’s dilemma. They will have to solve this problem. But here the great responsibility lies with the PS, as the structuring party of Portuguese democracy.”
In relation to the specialized process, which could distort the budget, Miranda Sarmento recalls the words of Pedro Nuno Santos and other socialist leaders who said they were committed to the budget balance presented by the Government. “If this is the case, there can be no measures on the ground that would distort this budget balance.”
“I hope that the PS first makes the budget viable and maintains responsibility in its specialty and does not distort the Budget,” he assumes.
As for Chega, the line has already been drawn. The Minister of Finance guarantees that he has not received any indication from the Prime Minister’s cabinet to study the impact of the measures proposed by Chega. “No. I never received any indication about it.”
Miranda Sarmento admits that she participated in the two public political meetings with Chega. There was the Minister of Finance, Parliamentary Affairs and the Presidency with all the parties. Chega was represented, in the first, by André Ventura, in the second he was the parliamentary leader. “These are the two meetings in which I participated. “We never received any proposal from Chega and I never analyzed any proposal from Chega.” Miranda Sarmento says she is unaware that there have been any proposals from Chega in this regard. “Not that I know of.”
Is there an open door with Chega? “We always said no, that we would not negotiate agreements with Chega.”
In the interview, and after presenting her 2025 Budget proposal, Miranda Sarmento rejects having political weight within the Government. “I am number three in the Government. There is no decision that affects expenses or income that does not have to go through the scrutiny of the Ministry of Finance and I have the full support of the prime minister in all the decisions that are made,” he guaranteed that he did not receive instructions from the Prime Minister will not address further political issues at the budget presentation press conference. “I speak from what I understand.”
Source: Observadora
