The problem behind the Madeira debt is lack of democracy. The Regional Parliament is powerless to check and control the executive since it has as much power as the German Reichstag after Hitler's 1933 Enabling Act. Jardim's unending program of building infrastructures, the main source of the Madeira debt, is used to finance his election campaigns, providing his main means of propaganda, the daily inauguration ceremonies held in the run up to elections.
The problem behind the Madeira economy is lack of free-market. Tourism is the only sector which does not depend on the Government and where the Government finds it hard to interfere. All the other sectors are heavily dependent of the Government, if not for custom and financing, then for getting past red tape and for 'favours'. The ports monopoly, for instance, was handed to the Sousa Group in a very strange arrangement. It costs many times over to unload a container in Madeira than in the Azores and this is one of the reasons why cost of living is high in Madeira, despite the EU susbsidies to keep it low.
Building construction was one of the dodgiest sectors. Many promotors had difficulty in getting building approval; they would sell their land only to find that someone 'connected', after a simple phone call, could build twice as much on it than they would be allowed. This has since subsided, partly because of the real estate market crash and partly because hundreds of people, fed up with this situation, resorted to the courts, moving proceedings against illegaly approved buildings.
The Government has hundreds of ways of favouring some and harassing others, be it through inspections, red tape or economic persecution.
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