Carlos Moedas said that he would like the Military Hospital to be an intergenerational center. The president of the Lisbon City Council wanted to house the immigrants taken from Anjos in the establishment.
The mayor of Lisbon stated this Thursday that the migrants taken from the Igreja dos Anjos needed immediate help, so the municipality gave up installing them in the Belém Military Hospital.
“This solution [para as pessoas em situação de sem-abrigo acantonadas há meses em tendas junto à Igreja dos Anjos] was found, It had to be immediate and the solution to the Belém Barracks was not immediate“, justified Carlos Moedas.
The mayor of Lisbon also said that he would “like” the Military Hospital to be an intergenerational center, as demanded by the population of the Ajuda parish, but he stressed that this depends on the owner of the building, which is the Ministry of Defense. .
“What I would like is for the Belém Barracks to truly be an intergenerational centeras was promised to the people, long before I was president of the House. Obviously this depends on the Ministry of Defense, because that real estate asset, that building, does not belong to the City Council, it belongs to the Ministry of Defense. But the Chamber, for its part, will continue fighting to make this building the intergenerational center promised to the population,” said the mayor, speaking to journalists on the sidelines of the “Motivate for Change” Conference. organized by Comunidade Vida e Paz, in Lisbon.
On Wednesday, the Minister of the Presidency, António Leitão Amaro, stated that the Lisbon City Council (CML) “no longer has any interest” in using the former Belém Military Hospital, in Ajuda, to temporarily welcome immigrants, a position that the Government respects.
“The mayor of Lisbon listened to the appeals of the population who understood that they did not want to locate him there. We even considered the possibility of transforming it into an intergenerational center in the future. Even so, the CML, and we respect it, understood that it should have a different strategy,” said António Leitão Amaro, in the parliamentary commission on Constitutional Affairs, Rights, Freedoms and Guarantees.
The minister added that the Lisbon City Council “looked for another strategy and was no longer interested in applying the protocol” that provided for the Government to provide the former Belém Military Hospital to temporarily accommodate immigrants.
“On the part of the Government there was a will to do, we developed the protocol, adapt it to a future evolution towards an intergenerational center, now it implied additional financial negotiation, I understand the CML’s reluctance in this regard,” he said.
Source: Observadora
