(Article published in the ‘Garajau’ in August 2009)
To Alberto João Jardim, meeting out justice is his own prerogative, an attitude which on the one hand leads him to constantly send ‘messages’ to the judges and the Public Prosecutor’s office and, on the other hand, to pay homage to and to decorate those friends of his who have ‘suffered’ at the hands of justice. Apparently, nothing perturbs him more than news that implicates some friend or collaborator. On such occasions Jardim-President defends his protégés intransigently and calls for justice (his own kind of justice) to be made against those who embark on ‘dirty’ campaigns.
To Alberto João Jardim, meeting out justice is his own prerogative, an attitude which on the one hand leads him to constantly send ‘messages’ to the judges and the Public Prosecutor’s office and, on the other hand, to pay homage to and to decorate those friends of his who have ‘suffered’ at the hands of justice. Apparently, nothing perturbs him more than news that implicates some friend or collaborator. On such occasions Jardim-President defends his protégés intransigently and calls for justice (his own kind of justice) to be made against those who embark on ‘dirty’ campaigns.
False Moralists
The ‘Lobo’ case is an excellent case study. In the summer of 2004, news of irregularities in the Municipality of Ponta do Sol were made public. In an inauguration ceremony held in that Municipality, António Lobo, the Mayor, called on the population to pay no attention to ‘those who insist in debasing politics and who, even worse, affected to be its moralists’. Jardim reinforced this appeal, playing down the news, explaining that, now and again, ‘some individuals who only think about money and their own personal ego and vanity’, show up. ‘Its not worth wasting time with those who want to be important, who don’t believe in their own values and capacity, it’s a psychological problem’.
No sooner had António Lobo been arrested by the Investigative Police, during the pre-campaign period for the 2004 regional elections, Jardim raised the tone of his recriminations, complaining against ‘attempts at coups-d’état by agents of the Portuguese Republic’. He accused the Investigative Police of being in league with the Communist Party. ‘There is a clear interference in the elections, by institutions that have the duty to be independent’. ‘If there are no illegalities’, he threatened, ‘we will find out if all this was no more than a political coup’. If that is the case ‘the members of the justice corporations that participated in this attempted coup will be punished.’ Days later, in another inauguration, Jardim continued to defend Lobo, reminding the public that no-one is guilty until proven in court. At the same time, he continued to denounce the ‘campaign orchestrated by sinister forces.’ He announced he had asked for an inquest to be made in the Investigative Police and that if this was discovered to be no more than a farce, by a political cabal, the organizers were to pay dearly for it: ‘If its a lie, someone has to pay for the humiliation suffered by the people of Ponta do Sol and its Mayor’. ‘I won’t allow a corporation to act as an occupying colonial force in Madeira’. Lobo was subsequently tried and convicted. (continues)
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