Bye Bye Autonomy

Autonomy Statue Removed

The statue of Autonomy has been removed from the Autonomy Square. Surely symbolical of the state Madeira has reached, so heavily indebted that it only has Autonomy in name and in Jardim's propaganda.

Symbolic also that it is being removed as part of a project which includes the building of a contested project for a new shipping dock in Funchal harbour, which is being financed with the money received for reconstruction following the 20th of February flash floods.

The docking facility is another pork-barrel project to fill the pockets of a handfull of constructors. Experts say that due to its exposure to the open seas it may only be operational half the time.

Public Tender for Car Inspections Judgement

The Central South Court has anulled the public tender for car inspections which was "won" by the Henriques brothers, friends of Bertie's.

A rival firm, CIMA which had come in first place for the tender took the adjudication to Court in 2007. CIMA had actually made the best offer and come out on top of the list, but the Regional Government decided that the Henrique's offer was more coherent and better adapted to the Region. The Court has decided otherwise and the Regional Government may now have to pay a substantial compensation to CIMA for its decision.

Curiously, the same thing happened with the parking concession which Funchal City also attributed to the Henriques despite having received a better offer. The City also had to pay a compensation to the competing firm.

In conclusion, the Henriques win these tenders despite not having the best proposals; they profit from these illegal decisions; the Government and Câmara lose in Court and the taxpayer has to pay compensation to the other companies. No civil or criminal responsibility is asked of the decision-makers and the taxpayer foots the bill. Portuguese justice.

Denge fever in Madeira

Alarm has spread about Denge fever on Madeira, fueled by the incompetence and inability of the Jardim Government.

In the middle of last week, two cases of Denge were reported and 22 more were under surveillance. By Friday there were 36 confirmed cases.

No analyses were carried out over the week-end and the authorities, in a sort of soviet-style denial policy, say they will not divulge any further information, to avoid alarmism!

The Light of Thought

Testimony of Pedro Vieira in the book on Martins Junior

I was a young man of 14, but I will never forget that strange episode when we had a two week power cut during Christmas. Why? My father had had the courage to supply electricity to Father Martins Junior's election campaign kiosk for Machico municipality, challenging the dominant power. I confess we never saw with so much clarity in he middle of the darkness they wished to impose on us. We understood that liberty was about to cross the threshold of the City and that the day of victory was at hand.

On the 17th of December 1989, Father Martins won the elections. I remember that night with great joy and emotion. The people partied in downtown Machico, commemorating their own victory! For me, it was the victory of seeing the light. The fear had disappeared, the air was lighter, history had begun a new cycle. We were living "April" (i.e. the Revolution that toppled the dictatorship) in its plenitude.

Bertie takes it personally

With the internal elections approaching, despite being away from the region, Bertie writes a daily diatribe against Albuquerque in the Jornal. This is from yesterday's piece.

With the hypocrisy involved in this storming of the PSD/Madeira, organized by the same old enemies of the Party, internally mobilizing lack of scruples, we have seen the falsity of the statement "this is not personal".
So when someone launches an attack against the party leader, in public, with the help of the same old adversaries, this "is nothing personal"?
When they resort to the press which is hostile to the party leader - knowing that this hostility has a pathological bent - to make personal attacks attempting at civic assassination, without first having a loyal, eye to eye, frontal conversation,  they still have the hypocrisy to say "this is nothing personal"?...

When the Regional Congress of the PSD Madeira is to be held in two years time to elect the substitue of the current leader, do you think it proper that a "gang"  should organize itself for the most diverse sinister motives, within and outside the Party, to expel the person (i.e. myself, the great Bertie) who changed Madeira and led the Madeira PSD with success, wishing to humiliate him for personal "vengeance"?!
This is "nothing personal"...

Its unbelievable that a present day politician and leader can write and publish this kind of crap and get away with it. 

Bertie the Dictator to cleanse Party of rival's supporters

Bertie the Dictator cannot tolerate the challenge of having to face a rival candidature for party leadership and has promised to clean the Party of Albuquerque's supporters after the November Party Congress.

Never in over three decades has his party in Madeira had to vote between two candidatures and this is confusing many a pretty mind. Jardim's idolization within the Party has always rendered normal democratic processes a blasphemy.

From Bertie's perspective Albuquerque cannot be running as an alternative, but is the 'front man of the Party's enemies',  'trying to rupture the Party from within'. He is no more than a vain, opportunist traitor who bites the hand that feeds and 'stabbed' the great leader in the back.

Jardim has always purged and persecuted those within the PSD who challenged him in any way, however insignificant, which is one of the reasons no-one would ever even dare consider running against him... until now that his popularity has plummeted and people are totally revolted by him; They can't stand to see him or bear to hear his voice any longer.

Jardim advocates Separatism

Weeks before the Party Congress where his leadership is being challenged, Jardim ups the stakes and presents a global motion which calls for the separation of Madeira from Portugal... if the region is not granted greater (?) autonomy.

Jardim has always used the threat of separatism for pure demagogery, saying he did not advocate it but that the policies of his enemies in Lisbon and their 'attacks' on Madeira were stoking up separatist sentiments. He promised to take Lisbon's 'colonial' policies to the UN and so on.

His threats have always been part of a political ploy to stir emotions and Jardim himself has never taken these arguments at face value. The difference is this time, in desperation, he has gone beyond insinuating a separatist threat, to actually advocating the possibility of independence.

...But the threat is carried out without conviction and confidence. It is a written threat, lost in pages of a long motion, not one of his violent rants. The front page headline in the Jornal is revealing of his loss of direction. The separatist threat is relegated to a small headline at the bottom of the page, while the main headline is the increase in banana production!

Coito Pita on Albuquerque’s Oedipus Complex

The state-owned Jornal da Madeira, whose editorial line is totally dominated by Jardim, has intensified attacks on Jardim’s Party rival. Here is an excerpt from an article written by the regional PSD MP, Coito Pita, published yesterday.

If anyone, at the invite of the president of a party, has been vice-president of the parliament, vice-president of the party, deputy secretary-general, candidate for mayor, does anyone internally think it is normal that this person, merely out of vanity, should call into question the leadership of the person to whom he owes everything?

This is not a question of ideas, if so nobody knows them, its an internal split to satisfy his ego and the will of outside interests. It could even be so, but never coming from someone whose rise was due to the invitation of the person he is now challenging.

And its also not the application of the rule of democratic change, for one simple reason: even within parties it is unacceptable for someone who is part of a group to call into question the leader of the group, change comes from outside from those who owe that leader nothing.

This to me is immoral, it violates and offends my principles, it is unacceptable and unreasonable.

This is why our Penal Code uses the term qualified homicide to the act of a son killing his father, to show it is particularly reprehensible and perverse.

The article is revealing on the internal workings of the local PSD and the canine loyalty and total subservience expected of the militants and even of the leadership to the ‘great leader’ to whom every single member of the party owes his position.