Jardim steps down, 2014 in review

Jardim resigned as head of the Regional Government on the 12th of January, following internal elections won by the former mayor of Funchal, Miguel Albuquerque. The latter beat Jardim's appointed successor, Miguel António Correia, in the second round of elections.

2014 was rather depressing. Not only was the Cuba Livre hidden debt investigation shelved by the prosecutor, despite having found that the debt was deliberately hidden. Nobody was held accountable, which is typical of the Public Prosecution in Portugal.

The eight PND activists accused in the protest held in the Jornal da Madeira were convicted. The judge, Joanna Dias, known to be pro-regime even noted that it was not proved that the Jornal is not impartial - when even the candidates to the leadership of the PSD were publicly protesting its being an instrument of Jardim. The judgement is being appealled.

In the light of the judgement, the PND put in a request that the cases brought against the Jornal for election violations be speeded up. Two weeks later they were all shelved with absolutely absurd premises. Such as that the newspaper was not responsible for opinion pieces, ignoring the fact that all the opinion peices were written by Jardim's party members and there was no pluralism of opinion whatsoever. In one case the prosecutor even ignored completely two decisions of the Constitutional Court taken before the elections, which the Jornal chose to ignore. We appealed both.In the first case, the judge maintained the Public Prosecutor's view; in the second, the one with the two decisions of the Constitutional Court, the judge has remained silent...

Gil Canha and I were also convicted in the lower court in two libel cases brought against the Garajau over the Ports case.  Last year, however, the Supreme Court acquitted the Sol newspaper, against which the Ports had brought an action against an article which covered most of the same material. As our lawyer pointed out, the jurisprudence is shifting from the Courts protecting the powerful, to protecting the right to criticise, even if the criticisms are unpleasant.

In Court the accusation lawyer made much of his friendship with Cristina Pedra and that she had been appointed advisor to the Court, such was her fantastic reputation. He centered his attack on the fact we were convinced that criminal accusations would result of the investigation, which turned out not to be the case. Our lawyer then proceeded through all the scams the company had made, that despite not being criminal, due to the nature of the company, meant that perhaps Cristina Pedra may not be held up to be the saint she was being portrayed as being, but rather as an ordinary mortal. He noted the political controversy over the ports monopoly, which still exists to this day, and the political role of the Government in maintaining the system, and the sale of its quota of the company soon after the facts which were subject of the investigation became public.

Jornal Trial Over

Selfie of the accused with lawyer on the steps of the Court

The trial of the protest against the Jornal's continued violation of the election laws finished last week. The judgement is due on the 24th.

None of the cases brought against the Jornal by the National Comission of Elections has yet reached Court.

The last few months have been taken up with a marathon of court trials brought by the Jornal and the Ports, which are not quite finished. They resume in September

Jornal publishes PSD results before they occurred!

The Jornal yesterday published the results of the PSD Regional Council meeting before they were actually voted. Albuquerque's motion to anticipate the party leadership elections was reported to have been voted down before the actual voting took place. The PSD militants greeted this act with shock and surprise, but to those in opposition it's no surprise. Jardim has always been obnoxious about flouting all rules and laws.

Even more amazing is that the Jornal refused to publish two pages of paid publicity: Jardim's latest rival, Miguel de Sousa's political program. This is a government-owned newspaper, which receives four million Euro per year to cover its losses, mismanagement and so on… and which refuses paid publicity. Let it be said that the PSD's  (i.e. Jardim's) programs are always published for free in this newspaper and sometimes they run to a dozen pages spread over several issues. The opposition's programs are naturally boycotted and obviously they do not want to support the dictator paper with publicity. For the Jornal to refuse publicity from a PSD candidate really shows  the depths to which the regime has sunk.

Of course, the person who is really morally responsible for this state of affairs- THE ONLY ONE - is the bishop of Funchal, D. António Carrilho, for the newspaper's editorial statutes confer him the power to designate the executive editor and to orient the paper's editorial line. The bishop both refuses to take on his duties and refuses to resign from them: He acknowledges that he gives Jardim full power to do as he pleases with the paper, but insists on remaining his alibi: that the editorial power lies not in the hand of the Government but of the CHURCH.

Madeira is a real case study into how democracy can be totally subverted.

Director of the Jornal to stand trial for biased election coverage

The director of the Jornal da Madeira is to stand trial for biased coverage of the Presidential elections held in 2011.

The Jornal moved preliminar proceedings to have the case dismissed, but its arguments did not persuade the judge.

This is the first of three similar cases pending. An earlier one was expired, despite the judge finding that there were grounds for prosecution.

Jardim acuses Michael Blandy of Fomenting Coup d'Etat

Less than a week after the elections, the Jornal da Madeira printed a news article accusing Michael Blandy of fomenting a coup d'etat:

It accuses Blandy of having a "diseased obssession" against Jardim and continues: "In the last two years, or be it, since the 2011 regional elections, Madeira is witnessing an attempt at an internal coup d'etat, lead by the Blandy economic group, which assumes itself as the real leader of the opposition".

The piece is not signed by any journalist and was given a full front page spread.

Jardim's propaganda reminds me of the Khaddafi's interview shortly before the dictator was ousted, when he kept repeating "my people love me, my people love me" and blamed all his troubles on foreigners.

What was different about the last elections

In a talk show, last week, the PSD representatives had a common theme tune: The choice of the people must be respected, after all, these were democratic elections just like all the previous ones.

Not quite. Although the result was no doubt due to Jardim's ever growing impopularity, there were also less violations of the election laws.

Jardim's trump card has always been the public inauguration ceremonies. These occasions were marked by huge banquets for the attending masses, preceded by  political speeches where Jardim ranted against the opposition parties. Two or three of these ceremonies would be held daily and Jardim's hate speech would be broadcast over television and radio...

This year, not only were the inaugurations fewer, but some were devoid of the usual banquets and Jardim kept his speeches impartial and short - less than two minutes. With several cases pending in the justice system for election violations, perhaps he was forewarned by state entities not to push his luck.

Jardim's other main weapon is the state-owned Jornal where the opinion-pieces are all written by PSD militants. In the run-up to elections, this usually meant three daily pieces praising Jardim and trashing the opposition. Now, however, most of the article-writers have dwindled away, and apart from Jardim himself, only one or two of his bootlickers remain active, and even their articles are luke warm.

The Jornal, however, continued to toe the line, promoting the PSD candidates above all others. In some editions, the PSD candidatures got twice as much coverage as all the other candidatures put together. A clear violation of the law, which should earn the director yet another criminal suit. Curiously, this bias towards the PSD candidatures was not due to coverage of the candidates themselves, but to the coverage of the campaign actions of a non-candidate - Jardim!

Jardim tears newspaper

President Jardim, while visiting the offices of the Madeira rally, took the opportunity to tear up a copy of the Diário de Notícias newspaper.

In the run up to the elections, the government owned freebie newspaper, the Jornal, has been covering almost exclusively the initiatives of the PSD candidates.

4 Proceedings against the Jornal for Election Violations

Four criminal proceedings against the Jornal are currently underway at the Public Prosecutor's Office:

2135/19.2 TAFUN, violation of election laws for the 2009 National and Municipal elections

3539/11.9 TAFUN, violation of the elections laws for the 2011 Presidential elections

1327/12.4 TAFUN, violation of the election laws for the 2011 national elections

2011/10.2 TAFUN, violation of election laws for the 2011 regional elections...

Eight charged over Jornal protest

The Public Prosecutor´s Office is bringing criminal charges against 8 candidates of the PND, New Democracy Party, for the protest carried out against the Jornal da Madeira during the last regional elections campaign. The Eight are:

Marcio Amaro, actor
Dionisio Andrade, retired journalist, former president of the Madeira journalist's trade union
Helder Spinola, University lecturer, former president of the environmental NGO Quercus
Joel Viana, PND General Secretary, teacher
António Fontes, lawyer
Gil Canha, City Councilor, former head of environmental NGO Cosmos
Baltasar de Aguiar, lawyer
Eduardo Welsh, sinologist

Criminal proceedings were brought by the Jornal's director, Rui Nobrega Gonçalves, no stranger to the Public Prosecutor's Office himself. Nobrega has been investigated several times by the Criminal Police and the Public Prosecutor's Office, but he seems to lead a charmed life. Recently, a corrupt magistrate in the Public Prosecutor's Office threw out an investigation into fraud at the Jornal which had been instigated at the request of the Court Auditors. The corrupt magistrate, by all accounts a friend of Nobrega's wife, who is a judge, simply chose to turn a blind eye to the law.

Nobrega's luck, however, seems to be changing, and his days of impunity may be over. The editor of the Jornal is being charged by the Public Prosecutor's Office with violation of the election law and the Public Prosecutor's Office has ruled that the charges have to be extended to the Company itself and therefore its Director, Nobrega. This is the first of four charges of election law violation brought against Bertie's paper.

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.

Condemned for Libel

The author of this blog has been condemned to pay 6000 Euros to the manager of the Jornal da Madeira, Rui Nobrega as a result of a civil suit. The case was brought against the Garajau newspaper for a report on the criminal investigation carried out by the Investigative Police on the performance of Rui Nobrega when he was acting as a bankruptcy executor.

The investigation found that contrary to regulations, Nobrega failed to open an account in the name of the creditors, using instead the personal account of himself and his wife - a judge. The bankrupt company, called Masiluz, belonged to one of Jardim's chronies, Manuel da Luz, who regularly accompanied Jardim in his summer banquets (paid by public and private companies), known as the 'summer university'. Nobrega sold part of the goods of the bankrupt company back to a company belonging to Manuel da Luz's son in law, at prices which did not benefit the creditors. Nobrega was acquitted by the judge before the trial phase - he claimed not to know the connection between the two parties. The Investigative Police was reportedly unhappy about the acquittal, but had no power to appeal the decision. The Court found that the Garajau article was slanted against Nobrega, raising questions as to his acquittal.

In its few years of existence, the Garajau satirical newspaper was target of dozens and dozens of court cases, which all added up, asked for close to a million Euros in compensation. Most of the cases were thrown out or dropped. But the Garajau still had to pay thousands of Euros in judicial fees. Many of the cases were brought by members of the Regional Government and were paid for by the taxpayer. The Garajau was acquitted in all the criminal suits that went to Court, except one case which is pending at the European Court of Human Rights. One case was dropped during the trial phase itself when witnesses called for the prosecution divulged information that could have lead to self-incrimination.

Rui Nobrega has been the subject of various investigations and has been very gently dealt with, not to say protected, by the Public Prosecutor's Office. In 2009, the Court Auditors sent their report to the Public Prosecutor's Office in order that they invstigate the 'fake business' of the Jornal cover price. The Jornal has a cover price of 10 cents, but is distributed for free. The distributor 'bought' the Jornal and then was paid handsomely for distributing the Jornal for free. The 10 cent cover price was and is a ruse to recieve the official publicity of the municipalities, which by law can only be made in paid newspapers. The Public Prosecutor's Office, after two years of so-called investigation, shelved the case saying that the 10 cent cover price had no juridical relevance ...omitting any reference to the law that prohibits official municipal publicity in freeby newspapers.

National Comission of Elections condems Jornal again

The National Commission of Elections has again found that the Jornal da Madeira was not impartial in its coverage of the National Legislative Elections held in June 2011. Its coverage was favourable to the PSD in terms of space attributed. The PSD was the only party to recieve first page coverage (11 times). In terms of opinion pieces the Commission found that:
The Socialist Party is mentioned in 65 articles, 63 considered unfavourable and 2 neutral; It is the target of six cartoons, all considered unfavourable;
The PSD is mentioned in 14 articles, 8 favourable, 5 unfavourable (Jardim maintins a running battle with his party on the mainland. All references to the Madeira party are highly favourable); 5 unfavourable cartoons (the targets all belonging to the mainland) and one neutral;
The CDS is mentioned in 9 articles, 8 unfavourable and 1 neutral and one cartoon, unfavourable;
The Communist-Green Alliance is mentioned in six articles, 5 unfavourable and one neutral and one unfavourable cartoon;
The LEft Bloc is mentioned in five articles, 4 unfavourable and 1 neutral and 3 cartoons, all unfavourable;
The New Democracy Party is mentioned in 5 articles and one cartoon, all unfavourable;
The Labour Party is referenced in two articles and two cartoons, all unfavourable
The Earth Party is mentioned in two articles, unfavourable;
The remaining parties are mentioned in one article, unfavourable-

This result is hardly surprising since all the people who write political opinion pieces in the Jornal are PSD militants. The attacks against mainland PSD figures are consistent with the local PSD propaganda and aim to strengthen the local PSD presence within the national parliament).

The report has been sent to the local Public Prosecutor's Office to install criminal proceedings, as it has done on at least three occasions in the past. The local Public Prosecutor's Office has in the past systematically thrown out the cases, despite all the obvious and undeniable evidence. These decisions are currently on appeal.

The Jornal da Madeira is publicly funded to the tune of four million Euros per year and is handed out for free to the population. Its print run is hugely increased during the election periods.

Why Jardim hates the English

In the early 90's, when Jardim's party was beset with corruption scandals, Jardim began a more belligerent phase of his now 3 decade-long rule. With a tame TV and the Jornal under his control, the only news that bothered him was the Diário, half-owned by the Blandy family. Jardim needed a new fight to take the attention off the corruption and persecution scandals. He blamed the Diário and the English and set out on a hate-speech campaign, saying that the English wanted to return to the days of the dictatorship. He claimed there was no democratic opposition, that the Socialist Party had been infiltrated by the communist Party and wanted to install a totalitarian regime which would then be controlled by the English. He then set out to persecute and destroy the English and Anglo-descendent families by constantly vilifying them, destroying their businesses and expropriating their assets.

The campaign against the Diário then also began in earnest. He threatened those who put publicity in the Diário and ostracised all those who had any connection to the English. On many occasions over the last decades, he has threatened to expropriate the Diário itself and to find other means to run the 'foreigners' off the island. The English were the perfect scapegoats for all that went wrong. Like the Jews in Nazi Germany, they were portrayed as evil, shady characters, who were only interested in exploiting the Madeiran people. Like the Jews in Nazi Germany, Jardim used the law and state power to expropriate their assets, offering a symbolic compensation for them. The 'church' newspaper, the jardim-controlled Jornal, was one of the main vehicles for propagating this message. And 'cartoons' such as the one above showing the british flag and attacking the English have appeared on an almost weekly basis over the years

'What about the pact for democracy?' Reading between the lines

of a typical propaganda article published in the Jornal by Emanuel Janes 

During the last 38 years of (subverted) democracy  in Madeira, there have been various frustrated attempts of unifying the opposition to better combat the Jardinista governance, objective they could never achieve in isolation, as has been proved by successive elections which, ignoring these prophets of doom, have always handed Jardim absolute majorities.

The objective of this opposition, which unfortunately Madeira has (how unfortunate!), has always been to bad-mouth in an attempt to dethrone the PSD and its president, a man who gave his all for his land (like Kim Il Sung, Hitler?), who sacrificed his life, his family (tears well up in my eyes) and his political career (no less), to defend Madeira from the attacks of the colonialists (!!!!), both the local and continental ones. Without him (the heaven-sent one), Madeira would continue to be a colonial district of  medieval land with 'half a dozen camels playing cards at the tables of the Golden Gate' (presumably a quote from the great leader).

We all know that the  political regime in Portugal and the autonomous regions is a democracy, with free and democratic elections (where parliamentary immunity protects PSD members from being prosecuted for totally subverting the elections)…  But the opposition parties, because they do not accept their electoral defeats, calls them into question…All this goes to show how embarrassing and devoid of ideas this opposition is. It makes one laugh (all the way to the bank, I'm sure), when really it should make us feel like crying!

Now, with their fertile imagination, they have drummed up a 'pact for democracy' which has the Regional Government and all its supports laughing their pants off. This pact gathers ALL the opposition parties in a singularly abnormal situation, where you find socialists, catholics, fascists, communists, anarchists, people with chips on their shoulders and morons, in a desperate attempt to defeat Dr. Ablerto João (let me lick his boots some more please) and the PSD. .. 

This childish and offensive drivel goes on like this till the end of the page.

World Association of Newspapers writes to President Cavaco

The World Association of Newspapers (WAN) sent a second letter to President Cavaco Silva about the Jornal da Madeira. The letter states that the Jornal has ignored the decisions and recommendations of the Press Regulation Entity and the Competition Authority  and that the distortion in the Madeira press market has worsened over the years.

The WAN is concerned about the funding conceded to the Jornal in the 2012 budget, which disrespect the recommendations of the above-mentioned entities. This ‘seems to confirm that the Jornal da Madeira is a publicly-funded tool used to support the President of the Regional Government who is in power for 34 years’.

According to the WAN the funding exceeds what any private investor could be expected to inject into a press company and result in a massive distortion of what should be a free and transparent press.

The Wan urges the Portuguese President to, in conjunction with the Prime Minister, ‘take the necessary measures to terminate the use of public funding which violates the principles of freedom of expression.’

Commission of Election condemns Jornal for the 4th time

The National Commission of Elections has for the fourth time determined that the Jornal's coverage during the election period was biased in favor of the PSD. THE FOURTH TIME.

The case has been sent to the Public Prosecutor's office for criminal procedures. Will the Public Prosecutor's Office take any action? I hope the case is not given again to Assistant Prosecutor Gameiro, since there is a conflict of interests - friendships.

Jardim reacts to Expresso through cartoon

'The Expresso is set against Madeira'...'Almost nobody here buys the main newspaper of the "termites"'

The Expresso is owned by Pinto Balsemão, former Portuguese Prime Minister and PSD leader.

The "termites" or "white ants" are a term Jardim uses to qualify those he also designates as 'undesirable', 'marginal', 'criminal' elements of the 'old soceity'. He often urges the population to 'erradicate' these undesirables and run them out of town.

Rui Fino, former deputy editor of the Jornal, purged in 2000 for complaining about the Government's constant control and interference of the newpspaper's editorial line, identified Jardim as being the author of the the cartoon's captions.

Jornal's veiled bomb threat to Journalists

The Jornal da Madeira issued a veiled bomb threat to the journalists Tolentino Nobrega of the Publico and Lilia Bernardes of the Lisbon Diário de Notícias.

The threat came in the anonymous daily cartoon Boca Pequena, which is often used by President Jardim to send messages promising retaliations, expropriations and inciting violence against particular targets. Once the threats have been carried out, they are complimented by a 'you had been warned message' in a follow-up cartoon.

In this cartoon, published on the 2nd of May, one character accused the two journalists of writing things against Madeira, the other replied that they would have to escape to the mainland 'after John's birthday'. The latter was the codeword for the FLAMA separatist terrorist movement's blowing up of the regional radio station in 1975.

The reference is common knowledge to all those who lived through this period, particularly to people such as Tolentino, who himself escaped a car bomb attack in those dark years of Jardim's rise to power.

Budget debate: Jornal 'helps' the Diário

The Secretary for Social Affairs, Jardim Ramos, explained, during the budget presentation, that the 3 million loan conceded to the government-owned newspaper the Jornal, helped to save the newspaper industry as a whole. The Jornal, he said, is printed in a company belonging to the Diário group. This company receives 1.5 million Euro per year to print the Jornal. If the Jornal closes, he said, the Diário would no longer be economically viable, he argued.