Paulo Portas

Paulo Portas
Deputy Prime Minister of Portugal
Incumbent
Assumed office 24 July 2013
President	Aníbal Cavaco Silva
Prime Minister	Pedro Passos Coelho
Preceded by	Eurico de Melo (last holder, 1987-1990)
Minister of Foreign Affairs
In office 21 June 2011 – 24 July 2013
President	Aníbal Cavaco Silva
Prime Minister	Pedro Passos Coelho
Preceded by	Luís Amado
Succeeded by	Rui Machete
Minister of National Defence
In office 6 April 2002 – 12 March 2005
President	Jorge Sampaio
Prime Minister	José Durão Barroso Pedro Santana Lopes
Preceded by	Rui Pena
Succeeded by	Luís Amado
Member of Parliament
Incumbent
Assumed office 27 October 1995
Constituency	Aveiro
Personal details
Born	Paulo de Sacadura Cabral Portas (1962-09-12) 12 September 1962 Lisbon, Portugal
Political party	People's Party
Alma mater	Catholic University of Portugal
Religion	Roman Catholicism

Paulo de Sacadura Cabral Portas (born 12 September 1962, Portuguese pronunciation: [ˈpawlu ˈpɔɾtɐʃ]), is Portugal's Deputy Prime-Minister and leading conservative politician. He is the leader of Portugal's only politically to-the-right major party, the Democratic and Social Centre – People's Party (CDS-PP), on whose lists he has been elected to the Portuguese Parliament on every legislative election since 1995. He was Minister of Defence from 2002 to 2005 and Minister of State and Foreign Affairs from 2011 to 2013, both times in coalitions of the PSD and his CDS-PP. He has been dogged by several controversies, in particular a costly purchase of submarines when he was Minister of Defence.

Early life

Paulo Portas was born in Lisbon and grew up in a free thinking, politically aware family with rural landowner roots in Vila Viçosa on his father's side and military tradition on his mother's (niece of Portuguese aviation hero Artur de Sacadura Cabral). His father, Nuno Portas, was an influential post-modernist architect, who professed progressive Roman Catholic views. His mother, Helena Sacadura Cabral was an economist, journalist and author, who held more conservative views that appear to have passed on to Paulo Portas who stayed living with her after his parents separated. In contrast, his older brother Miguel Portas stayed with their father and became a communist and later a leftist. Their half-sister is Catarina Portas, a well-known Portuguese journalist, businesswoman and media personality.^[1]

Following the 1974 revolution in Portugal, Paulo Portas was briefly sent to school in France but returned in 1975 to study at Lisbon's top private high school (Colégio S. João de Brito). In 1984 he got a law degree from the Portuguese Catholic University, where he met Manuel Monteiro who, 10 years later, would serve as Portas's stepping stone into the CDS-PP and national politics.^[2] He is said to be a Church-going Catholic.^[3]

Press career

At age 12 in junior high school, Paulo Portas is said to have launched a school newspaper called Risos e Sorrisos ("Laughs and Smiles");^[4] it is not known how long it lasted. In his mid-teens (1974–75) he began contributing to the official newspaper of the youth wing of the PSD (which at the time was called Partido Popular Democrático, 'PPD'). The paper was called "On Behalf of Socialism" (Pelo Socialismo) and Portas became its chief editor.^[5] As a teen he also began working on the conservative weekly newspaper O Tempo^[6] and soon his eloquent anti-leftist views earned him guest opinion columns in the few conservative newspapers of post-revolution Lisbon. He first became nationally known at 15 years of age when he wrote an article for a daily evening newspaper (Jornal Novo) under the heading "Three Betrayals" ("Três Traições") directly accusing then president Ramalho Eanes, prime minister Mário Soares and foreign minister Diogo Freitas do Amaral of "selling out" Portugal's African colonies in 1974-75. The article earned him a libel lawsuit from President Eanes and valuable public exposure to get his own weekly opinion column in O Tempo and, some years later, in the new weekly Semanário.^[7]

In 1987, he co-founded, with Miguel Esteves Cardoso, the weekly newspaper O Independente, which became known for its innovative editorial concepts as well as for denouncing political scandals, often on the basis of little more than hearsay.^[8] In reporting such scandals, Portas personally targeted the then prime-minister Aníbal Cavaco Silva and most of his ministers (1985–1995) thus making several enemies in the PSD.^[9] Although it reached very respectable circulation levels in the 1990s, O Independente never quite reached Portas's stated objective of outselling the leading Portuguese weekly Expresso and eventually folded in 2006.^[10]

In the 1990s Portas participated as panel member in a popular weekly night TV talk show and in 2006, after his first stint as a government minister, he returned to TV with his own show (O Estado da Arte) where he commented on current issues.^[11]

Political career

The formative years, 1974-85

Paulo Portas showed a precocious interest in politics and as a child engaged in lively political discussions with his elders.^[12] In 1975 he joined the youth wing of the Democratic Popular Party (PPD), which in 1976 became PSD Social Democratic Party. He would later profess to have been a staunch follower of PPD's founder Francisco Sá Carneiro, who is said to have relished the views of the 14 year-old Paulo Portas and personally sponsored his full PSD membership in 1978. Sá Carneiro died in 1980 and, for undetermined reasons, Portas quietly left PSD in 1982.^[13] He remained involved with politics through its popular opinion-columns in conservative newspapers.

The road to Parliament, 1986-97

Paulo Portas took his first big step into politics in 1986 with his personal endorsement of presidential candidate Diogo Freitas do Amaral, in support of whom Portas, already a well-known media pundit, campaigned with determination.^[14] However, Freitas do Amaral lost the election and Portas stepped back from politics to launch the "O Independente" newspaper project and became its first Director. By the 1990s he was a widely recognized national figure and stated more than once on TV that he "did not want to be a politician"^[15] but it would later become apparent^[16] that he was, on the contrary, moving full speed towards becoming Portugal's leading conservative politician. He is credited with helping his former University colleague (Manuel Monteiro) gain the leadership of the Centro Democrático Social (CDS) party in 1992 and with coming up with new strategies, such as rebranding the CDS as the Partido Popular (PP) in line with several of the major conservative European parties.^[17] In 1995, Portas formally joined the PP with the full support of Manuel Monteiro, who put him at the top of the party list in the district of Aveiro thus ensuring that he would become a member of the Portuguese Parliament in that year's legislative elections. In 1997 he ran and was elected member of the municipal chamber of Oliveira de Azeméis.^[18]

Affirmation as party leader, 1998-2001

In 1998, after the People's Party (CDS-PP) performed poorly in the 1997 local elections,^[19] Portas made his move to control the party by first manoeuvering to get Manuel Monteiro to resign, and then by defeating his hand-picked successor who underestimated Portas by comparing him to Mickey Mouse.^[20] On March 22, 1998, Portas finally became President of the CDS-PP after a bitter take-over that established Portas's reputation as a cunning politician who does not hesitate to remove those who stand in his way even if they had formerly been his friends or allies.^[21]

Upon taking over the CDS-PP, he immediately sought to energize the party and earn himself name recognition by campaigning in more media-friendly ways and soon became known by his appearances in public events that earned him the nickname "Paulinho das Feiras" (in English: "Paulie of the fairs").^[22] He is also said to have brought in political marketing experts to enhance his image and that of the party.^[23] In 1999, he headed the CDS-PP list to the European Parliament, got elected but only remained there less than six months. In 2001 he ran for Mayor of Lisbon and was soundly defeated.^[24]

Minister of Defence, 2002-05

In the 2002 legislative elections, the People's Party won 8.7 percent of the vote and 14 Parliament seats, which were sufficient to form a government majority with the Social Democratic Party that won the election.^[25] The CDS-PP participated in two coalition governments from April 2002 to March 2005 and Portas served as Minister of State and National Defence in the first (Durão Barroso) and Minister of State, National Defence and Sea Affairs in the second (Pedro Santana Lopes). As Minister of Defence, he presided over important reforms of the military, such as abolishing conscription,^[26] but his most lasting legacy was the upgrade of combat equipment for the armed forces that included the purchase of two submarines and 260 combat vehicles that would become the subject of much controversy after he left office (see below). As Minister of Defense, Paulo Portas was also determinant in aligning Portugal with George W. Bush's 2003 Iraq invasion by saying he had personally "seen irrefutable evidence of weapons of mass destruction" while on an official visit to Washington (see below).

Back in Parliament, 2006-11

In the 2005 early elections, the two incumbent coalition parties suffered a crushing defeat, with CDS-PP losing 60,000 votes and two of its fourteen seats in Parliament. For the next six years, Paulo Portas again became a Member of Parliament and led his party in the opposition to the ruling Socialist Party (PS). He temporarily lost the leadership in 2005-06 (to José Ribeiro e Castro) but regained it in 2007. His new strategy for the party was to focus on a few major issues (such as agriculture, tax cuts, fuel prices) in order for CDS-PP to retain conservative voters, who, in the past, supported CDS-PP but voted PSD at election time.

Minister of Foreign Affairs, 2011-13

In the 2011 elections, Portas's opposition strategies paid off and the CDS-PP achieved its best result in 30 years: 11.7% of the total vote. The winning party, the PSD, needed the CDS-PP to reach a parliamentary majority and the two parties formed a coalition government. By his own choice, Portas became minister of state and of foreign affairs and secured two more Minister slots for the CDS-PP. As minister, Portas chose (and relished)^[27] devoting himself fully to performing his official functions, in particular traveling abroad . He made his priority what he called "economic diplomacy",^[28] meaning the generation through diplomacy of business opportunities abroad for Portuguese companies.^[29] To that effect, he wrestled control of the Portuguese Foreign Investment and Trade Agency (AICEP) from the Ministry of Economics.^[30]

However, as Minister of Foreign Affairs he also chose to distance himself from the difficult decisions related to Portugal's economic austerity program. More than once he kept silent or expressed his disagreement with unpopular measures taken by the government to which he belonged,^[31] and on 2 July 2013 he abruptly decided to resign in protest at the appointment of a Finance Minister (Maria Luís Albuquerque) he did not approve of, a decision he called "irrevocable" (see below).

Deputy Prime-Minister, 2013-

When Paulo Portas resigned from the government in July 2013, Prime-Minister Passos Coelho feared the end of his coalition government and negotiated with Paulo Portas his permanence in a higher capacity as Deputy Prime-Minister with oversight over economic issues. Paulo Portas also obtained the substitution of the minister of economics by one of Portugal's most reputed CEOs and party colleague. He has publicly declared that he is against the continuation of IMF/EC/ECB-monitored economic programs in Portugal beyond the expiration of the current arrangement in 2014.^[32]

Controversies

Paulo Portas has been involved in several controversies that raise questions about his character^[33] but he has not been shown to have broken the law:

The Vichyssoise story

In 1993, Paulo Portas publicly embarrassed Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa (a prominent political figure in Portugal) when he stated on TV that Marcelo was one of Independente's sources albeit an unreliable one because he was prone to making up stories, such as when he gave an account of a political VIP dinner that had never taken place going as far as inventing that the soup served during the dinner was Vichyssoise.^[34] This did not prevent Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, in 1999 when he was leader of Portugal's Social Democratic Party (PSD), from seeking an elections alliance with Paulo Portas's PP that was initially agreed but collapsed shortly after due to Portas's involvement in the Moderna scandal (see below). Marcelo then had to resign from the PSD leadership and lost his opportunity to become prime-minister.^[35] Since then, in Portuguese politics, "Vichysoisse" (which is a cold soup) has served as a metaphor for "revenge that is best served cold" and for Portas's betrayal of his one-time allies—such as when he snatched the PP party leadership from his PP mentor Manuel Monteiro or when he undermined Pedro Passos Coelho in their coalition government.^[36]

The Moderna affair

In 1999 a scandal erupted concerning Universidade Moderna, a discredited university that had to be closed down by the government.^[37] Among many instances of embezzlement and questionable spending, it was shown that Paulo Portas was provided free of charge a top-of-the-line Jaguar automobile by the university.^[38] Portas defended the Jaguar perk as recognition for work he did for the polling centre of the university.^[39] One of the university's deans later said at trial that Portas had specifically justified his choice of a Jaguar because it was 'very British' and that he had received other perks and payoffs that contributed to the university's financial insolvency.^[40][41] Portas was summoned to the trial,^[42] but ultimately no evidence of wrongdoing against him emerged.^[43] The case had a further twist in 2002 when Paulo Portas became government minister and allegedly arranged the dismissal of the Director of the Economic Crimes Department of the Portuguese Police Force—Maria José Morgado—because, according to her, she was investigating the Moderna Affair.^[44] Paulo Portas had no comment.^[45]

The occupation of fort S. Julião da Barra

In 2002, when Portas committed his PP party to a government coalition with the PSD and became Minister of Defence he made sure to install himself in the historic seafront fort of S. Julião da Barra just outside Lisbon. This was the first time in memory a Portuguese Minister of Defence was attributed an official residence and resulted in the closing of the historic monument to the public and in new remodeling and upkeep costs for Portas's occupancy. He defended his move to the fort as "a gain for the State."^[46]

The irrefutable evidence of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction

In 2002 Paulo Portas was Minister of Defence and after returning from an official visit to the US he declared that "he had seen irrefutable evidence of Iraq's Weapons of Mass Destruction." The alleged existence of such weapons would eventually be shown to have been a fabrication of the George W. Bush administration, and, in 2011, one of Portugal's most prestigious generals publicly accused Paulo Portas of having deliberately lied as Minister of Defense back in 2002 and of not being fit to be a minister again (of Foreign Affairs, which Paulo Portas did become regardless).^[47] Paulo Portas never clarified what "irrefutable evidence" he "had seen" during his visit to Washington.

The Casa Pia sex scandal

In 2003 Paulo Portas's name came up in connection with the Casa Pia boys' sexual abuse scandal following a report in French newsmagazine Le Point alleging the involvement in underage male prostitution of a "minister from the coalition party in office,"^[48] which could only point to Paulo Portas or one of the two other male ministers from CDS-PP in Portugal's XVth Constitutional government at the time.^[49] Subsequently, during the Casa Pia trial one of the defendants suggested Paulo Portas might be implicated by calling on him as a witness.^[50] Following the conclusion of the trial, Paulo Portas was publicly accused by some of the victims.^[51] In a different take on Paulo Portas's alleged role, he has also been accused of using the Casa Pia scandal to tarnish his political enemies.^[52] However, there has been no material evidence whatsoever of Paulo Portas's involvement in the Casa Pia scandal either as a perpetrator or as a manipulator.

The 105 bank deposits and the Portucale case

In 2004 it was discovered that Portas's CDS-PP had deposited over 1 million euros (1,065,250 to be exact) through 105 low-denomination deposits into the party's accounts in an attempt to circumvent monitoring regulations on political party funding (see smurfing). The source of that money is not known, although it is known that CDS-PP fabricated donor receipts (including some using comical names such as "Jacinto Leite Capelo Rego," which in Portuguese is an erotic pun on words).^[53] In investigating, the police suspected the Espírito Santo Group (on whose bank the money was deposited) to have donated that money in connection with a tourism development named 'Portucale' in Benavente that entailed the cutting down of thousands of protected cork trees, which Paulo Portas, just before he stopped being government minister, allegedly facilitated.^[54] Paulo Portas denied any illegality and was not directly implicated in the case,^[55] while his (until then) best friend and party colleague Luís Nobre Guedes took the blame (and stopped talking to Paulo Portas^[56]). However, in investigating this case, the police intercepted phone calls that motivated another investigation into the costly purchase of two submarines by the Portuguese State (see below). It turned out that the company in charge of the Portucale project—called ESCOM and part of the Espírito Santo Group—was also an intermediary in the submarine deal, for which it had received 30 million euros in advance.^[57]

The submarines affair

As Minister of State and Defence in 2004, Portas was responsible for the decision to buy two submarines for the Portuguese Navy after reducing from three (with an option to buy a fourth) the original number of submarines that the previous government had indicated Portugal might buy from Germany's Ferrostaal industrial group.^[58] Paulo Portas also personally authorized that the agreed equipment for the two submarines be downgraded (without any reduction in price) by 30 million euros, which, coincidentally or not, was the same amount as paid to ESCOM (see above).^[59] The purchase was conducted through a sales intermediary named German Submarine Consortium (GSC) and the price of the submarines was between 712 million to 1.2 billion euros depending on calculations.^[60][61] The bill came due in 2010 and was a major factor in the budgetary crisis that erupted that year and led to political finger-pointing in what came to be known as "the submarines affair" (in Portuguese: "caso dos submarinos"). The deal also had an obscure "counterparts" provision for the German side to purchase Portuguese goods and provide equipment, that may have been overvalued by hundreds of millions of euros (again depending on calculations)^[62] giving plenty of margin for embezzlement schemes. Moreover, the deal was shown in Germany to involve corruption and two German executives were prosecuted and convicted in 2011 of bribery,^[63] including of the Portuguese consul in Munich, who said during the trial he had met with Paulo Portas in the context of the submarines' negotiations.^[64] A similar submarines deal in Greece was also shown to involve corruption and resulted in 2010 in the exoneration of the chief executive of Ferrostaal^[65] and in 2012 in the arrest of Paulo Portas's Greek Defence Minister counterpart Akis Tsochatzopoulos. In Portugal, a Navy commander and a former PSD leader (who was one of Portas's favourite targets when he was director of the newspaper "O Independente"^[66]) have been implicated of receiving at least 1 million euros.^[67] As of 2013, there is no evidence that Paulo Portas personally embezzled any funds from the submarines' purchase but the facts that (i) he was the Minister in-charge at the time and (ii) in contrast with his usual incisiveness, he has consistently been evasive about his role and any details of the purchase, make him the main figure in this disastrous deal for Portugal's finances. Paulo Portas has defended himself by claiming the deal was agreed before he became Minister and that he had no contact with the two intermediaries found guilty of corruption in Germany.^[68] In 2012, the Portuguese Ministério Público considered Paulo Portas a suspect in its ongoing investigation into the deal^[69] and found that the government files on the submarines' purchase from when Portas was Minister of Defence "had disappeared."^[70]

The Pandur armoured vehicles purchase

Similar to the submarines scandal, but much less talked about, Portas was also responsible for the acquisition of 260 Pandur armored combat vehicles for 364 million euros when he was Minister of Defence.^[71] He signed the contract during his final days in office, and, like for the submarines, it included a vague counterparts provision for the manufacturer to spend 516 million euros on Portuguese merchandises and investments.^[72] However, at least 400 million euros of those counterparts expired unused^[73] and the few investments made allegedly benefited a personal friend of Portas.^[74] In addition, there were major mechanical problems with the first batches of Pandur vehicles delivered and a subsequent Minister of Defence canceled the balance of the purchase.^[75] Like in the submarines' scandal, Paulo Portas has not been shown to have committed any illegalities, but there were major suspicions and an official investigation was launched in 2010.^[76]

The torpedoes purchase

In a similar pattern to the submarines and Pandur vehicles purchases, Paulo Portas was responsible for buying 24 torpedoes for the two submarines he had authorized. He signed off on the torpedoes purchase during his final week in office in 2005 leaving it to the next government to pay for the 46 million euros price tag. The contract also had a counterparts clause for the Italian manufacturer (Whitehead Alenia Sistemi Subacquei - WASS) to buy or invest in Portugal.^[77] Like for the submarines and combat vehicles, Portugal could not afford to buy the torpedoes, which has raised questions on Paulo Portas's motivations to close these major deals at all cost while he was still minister of Defence.

The 61,000 xerox copies

When the government changed in 2004 and Portas stopped being Minister of Defence, he took with him 61,000 xerox copies of, presumably, Ministry files and documents. This generated the impression that Portas was in possession of confidential and compromising intelligence to be used for personal purposes. A partial investigation by the Ministério Público in 2009 found no evidence of wrongdoing.^[78]

The BPN fire sale

In 2011 Paulo Portas was accused in Parliament of having negotiated hastily and on very detrimental terms for Portugal the sale of insolvent Portuguese bank Banco Português de Negócios (BPN) while on his first official as minister of foreign affairs to Angola.^[79] Shortly after, BPN was sold to Angola's BIC group for a token payment of 40 million euros with the Portuguese Treasury absorbing virtually all of BPN's bad assets and non-deposit liabilities at a cost of over 2 billion euros, plus unforeseen and potential liabilities that would eventually raise the total cost significantly above that.^[80] Paulo Portas refuted the accusation saying BPN "was not on the agenda" of his visit to Angola.^[81] Whether he negotiated BPN or not, Paulo Portas's low-key stance on BPN after he became minister contradicted his prior stance when he was in Parliament and was a ferocious critic of bailing out BPN at high cost for the Portuguese Treasury.^[82]

Resignation from the position of Minister of Foreign Affairs

In 2013, when Portas resigned "from the Government" he called his resignation "irrevocable".^[83] However, he later agreed to stay on in the government in a higher capacity as Deputy Prime Minister.^[84] There was much speculation on whether Portas resignation was an impulsive but genuine gesture of protest,^[85] a plan that backfired to distance himself from an increasingly unpopular government, or a power-grabbing gamble that he ultimately won.^[86] Either way, he reinforced his public image as a cunning politician as noted, among others, by former President Mário Soares, who publicly accused Paulo Portas of being a tergiversator ("salta-pocinhas" in Portuguese).^[87] President Mário Soares also publicly voiced a popular but unsubstantiated conspiracy theory scenario whereby Portas was being blackmailed into not resigning through incriminating evidence on his role in the submarines and Pandur vehicles purchases.^[88] Portas explained his change of mind about resigning saying he "preferred to pay a price of reputation for a better future".^[89] In Parliament, Portas quoted his idol and former Prime Minister Francisco Sá Carneiro to justify his position: "The country comes first and the party comes second. The personal circumstance of each one of us comes last."

Long time cooperation with Adolfo Mesquita Nunes

Perhaps the most stable professional and political relationship with Paulo Portas is his protégé Adolfo Mesquita Nunes , current Secretary of State for Tourism . Since 2001 Adolfo Mesquita Nunes was chief of staff when Paulo Portas was appointed councillor in the City of Lisbon . Followed him in their responsibilities in the European Parliament at the election as an MEP as assistant Doors and Gates return to Portugal , as Defence Minister , was his chief of staff . Adolfo Mesquita Nunes 2011 is available in the country campaign with Paulo Portas , has been the only politician who accompanied the popular leader throughout the campaign , daily. Indicated in the list of Party Chairman , Adolfo Mesquita Nunes becomes deputy and in February 2013, Secretary of State for Tourism , despite never having been responsible for no organizing body or promoter of this economic activity. Both are fully dedicated to the public cause , never having married or close to such marital status. In fact the most lasting relationship Paulo Portas , despite not being professional was only over the last 15 years with Adolfo Mesquita Nunes.^[90]

Personal life

Paulo Portas is a lifelong bachelor. He has assumed a wish to become a father in the future.^[91]

References

• Paulo Portas. In Infopédia [Em linha]. Porto: Porto Editora, 2003-2008. [Consult. 2008-12-18]. <URL: http://www.infopedia.pt/$paulo-portas>.