The president of the Assembly of the Republic opened his speech at the solemn session of November 25th this Monday, in Parliament, stressing that the democratic revolution of April 25th, 1974 is not devaluable, comparable or replaceable.
In an intervention that preceded that of the President of the Republic, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, who closed the ceremony, José Pedro Aguiar-Branco warned that he would immediately go straight to the controversial question about the historical significance of the military operation of 25 November 1975 and would not do realize that it doesn’t exist.
“There are those who fear that today’s ceremony will serve to compare dates and events, there are those who fear that this ceremony will serve to devalue the 25th of April, to disregard it. Allow me to be clear: the 25th of April is not devaluable, no It is comparable, it is not replaceable”, declared the President of the Assembly.
For the former social-democratic minister, marking November 25th “is nothing more than celebrating April and what only April began: Freedom and the desire for democracy”.
“Freedom and democracy that must be celebrated every day. Today is no exception. It’s even a greater day for that”, maintained José Pedro Aguiar-Branco.
Alluding to the controversy surrounding the 25th of November celebrations, the president of the Assembly of the Republic argued that “in democracy, differences count” and that disagreements are taken to public debate.
However, in the public debate, according to José Pedro Aguiar-Branco, sometimes “one falls into exaggeration”.
“Whether out of a need for affirmation or a desire for easy media coverage, we focus the political debate only on what separates us. We have more words for what is bad than for what is better. We often prefer to discuss more than We prefer to contest rather than applaud. Pointing, rather than celebrating – and almost always in a dramatic way, as if the future of democracy depended on it”, he warned.
Still in relation to the meaning of the 25th of November, the President of the Assembly of the Republic gave current examples of the type of political debate and compared them with what happened in Portugal before the 1975 military operation.
“We can discuss advertising on RTP, but no one questions the existence of private media, or freedom of the press, but it wasn’t always like that. We can discuss decolonization and the legacy of our presence in Africa, but we agree on the importance of Lusophony for the future”, he said.
José Pedro Aguiar-Branco went even a little further in his comparisons between Portugal before the 25th of November 1975 and the present.
“We can debate the lack of investment in the public health service, but no one questions the existence of the National Health Service anymore, we can draw red lines in reducing the IRC by one percent, but we no longer discuss the market economy and freedom of initiative. We can even discuss the color of vaccination cards, but no one disputes the premise of equality between men and women, equal rights before the law”, he said.
And, in conclusion, he concluded: “We may disagree on many issues and even exaggerate disagreements for media consumption, but none of us advocates that our political opponents be arrested.”
“But it wasn’t always like that. None of it was like that. In 75, some of the differences were discussed at the pump, literally”, he highlighted.
During the revolutionary period that followed April 25, 1974, according to Aguiar-Branco, “fear was a variable of action and coercion, physical or psychological, was a tool, as we say today, to impose political will, albeit a minority”.
“We have come from that time when some ideas were trying to impose themselves by force of arms, to the moment when we can debate them in freedom”, he added.
Source: rr.sapo.pt
