The mayor of Lisbon welcomed the victory of the European People’s Party in the June elections. “Moderation won,” he stressed, describing Lisbon as “an EPP city with an EPP vision.”
Carlos Moedas’ ambition to make Lisbon the innovation capital of the world is well known, but at the European People’s Party (EPP) dinner on Wednesday the mayor chose to highlight another characteristic of the city. “Lisbon is the capital of moderation,” he stressed.
“It is the capital of ‘everyone’, not ‘us’ against ‘them’. It is the capital of innovation for ‘everyone’, but our focus is on social well-being. The capital of an inclusive and gradual climate policy that starts with the people and unites peoples,” he said. “A city of the EPP with a vision of the EPP,” he summed up, at a time when some voices have emerged, such as that of Augusto Santos Silva, who maintain that “there are conditions for a candidacy for Lisbon with the entire left” united against the current mayor.
The President of Lisbon City Council was speaking at a dinner during the EPP’s parliamentary sessions, the first since the European elections that gave the European group victory. The event was attended by Prime Minister Luís Montenegro and personalities such as the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, the President of the European Parliament, Roberta Metsola, the leader of the AEA, Manfred Weber, and the former President of the European Commission, José Manuel Durão Barroso.
From moderates to radicals, the right wins the European elections. Will the “centre hold”?
Addressing words of thanks to the European leaders present, Carlos Moedas highlighted the victory of the EPP in the elections, according to a speech seen by The Observer. “It was not the socialists or the far right who won. It was us, the EPP,” he reiterated, adding that the ideology of the European group “is the reality.”
The word “moderation” was a central theme throughout the speech. “The results were clear in Europe: moderation won! Europeans do not want a dichotomy between “us” and “them”. Europeans want moderation, where “us” and “them” is replaced by “us with them”, he said. Carlos Moedas also said that the EPP “represents this moderation more than any other political party”.
Source: Observadora
