The parliamentary Transparency committee approved this Tuesday, by majority, a recommendation to Chega deputy Francisco Gomes to publicly retract statements he made, but later withdrew, regarding payments to deputies for the sector TVDE.
The recommendation is contained in a report prepared by the vice-president of the socialist bench Pedro Delgado Alves and which, according to parliamentary sources, only received votes against from Chega deputies.
In January, the president of the Assembly of the Republic, José Pedro Aguiar-Brancoasked the Transparency Commission for an investigation following statements by Chega deputy Francisco Gomes, who accused other deputies — but without identifying names — of requesting payments from an association in the TVDE sector.
During a hearing between the Infrastructure Committee and the Somos TVDE association, held on December 18th, Francisco Gomes said that “deputies from a political party with a seat on that committee (Infrastructure) had requested the payment of the amount of twenty thousand euros to an association in the TVDE sector, with the purpose of teaching how to circumvent approved legislation”.
According to the minutes, the Chega deputy stated the following: “Then we have deputies from a party that sits on this committee asking for 20 thousand euros from a TVDE association to teach how to get around legislation that was approved by the majority. In the morning they vote on the law, in the afternoon they teach how to get around it. Do you know what this is? Scam. This is banditry, carried out by deputies who sit on this committee”, he declared.
In the report now approved in parliamentary transparency committeeit was concluded that “it was fully proven” in the investigation, “by documentary evidence and by his own confession that deputy Francisco Gomes actually made the statements reported (…) which substantiated a generic accusation of the commission of crimes by the aforementioned association and undetermined deputies to the Assembly of the Republic”.
Now, “such conduct is incompatible with the parliamentary duties of institutional loyalty and diligence, set out (…) in the Code of Conduct for Deputies of the Assembly of the Republic”.
Pedro Delgado Alvesauthor of the report, then states that Francisco Gomes acknowledged that the statements he made had not been the subject of “indispensable independent and prior investigation, recognizing and fully assuming the failure that he indicated that he sincerely regrets, as it does not correspond to the standard of rigor, factual precision and ethical requirements”.
Despite having made this confession, by a majority, it was decided that Francisco Gomes must carry out “a public retraction in the same terms as he did in the communication he sent” to the Transparency Commission, “through a formal apology” at the Parliamentary Infrastructure Commission “within which the facts occurred”.
This apology must cover “both the representatives of the committee generally targeted, and the private entity targeted and which requested the clarification that is the origin of this investigation”.
The Chega deputy, elected by Madeira, is also recommended to “seek to avoid the repetition of similar behavior in the future”.
“This report must also be sent in full to the President of the Assembly of the Republic, so that he can take note of it, as a result of his order that determined the opening of the investigation”, it adds.
In your orderthe president of the Assembly of the Republic immediately left a warning if it was concluded that the Chega deputy’s statements had no basis.
“If such imputations do not correspond to the truth, their public formulation, without concrete identification of those targeted or objective indication of facts, is equally likely to constitute an institutionally reprehensible action, by casting serious and undetermined suspicions on deputies, contributing to the erosion of citizens’ trust in democratic institutions and the collective prestige of the Assembly of the Republic as a sovereign body”, wrote José Pedro Aguiar-Branco in his order on this case.
The decision by the parliamentary Transparency committee adds to other warnings addressed to the same bench, namely to deputy Filipe Melo, who was urged by the committee to apologize to socialist Isabel Moreira in the plenary, after having sent her kisses from the Board. Four months after this recommendation, the recommendation remains unfulfilled.
