Restoring confidence is the most serious task of the Portuguese Presidency

The Portuguese Presidency presented its working program in the European Parliament’s plenary. MEP Kinga Gál, President of the Fidesz-KDNP Delegation, pointed out in her speech that the Portuguese Presidency’s main task is to restore citizens’ confidence in the EU institutions and instruments and to strengthen their sense of security in the face of the pandemic, the economic crisis and the challenges of migration.

The President of the Delegation emphasized: The most important thing for EU citizens today is to get back to life as it was before the coronavirus pandemic. To do this, they must receive the vaccine as soon as possible. It is an impossible situation that while millions are vaccinated outside the EU, there is a shortage of vaccines in the Union, no matter how well organized the Member States’ vaccination systems are. This, in turn, severely undermines confidence in EU institutions.

“The main task of the Portuguese Presidency is to help ensure that there are enough vaccines. As to the economic downturn that has accompanied the epidemic, the effective implementation of the historic budget agreement is essential”, said the Fidesz MEP.

“The Presidency must restore citizens’ confidence that the EU wants to protect its external borders and knows how to do so; that illegal migration can be stopped and unauthorized migrants can be reversed; and that a mandatory immigration quota is not the answer. This last is simply not acceptable to the Visegrád countries. We expect the presidency to be our partner in understanding this”, the EPP politician stressed out.

There must also be a guarantee that the rule of law investigation cannot become a tool of extortion and that EU payments cannot be linked to abstract ideological conditions. MEP Gál also pointed out, “It is unacceptable that Vice-President Jourova threatened to withdraw money from the Hungarian Government in a statement. We therefore expect the Portuguese Presidency to conclude the Article 7 procedure in the Council”.

Regarding the Minority SafePack European Citizens’ Initiative, Kinga Gál also emphasized the need to restore confidence. “What is the purpose of winning a lawsuit against the European Commission, the support of nearly one and a half million signatures, and a majority of the European Parliament voting in favor of the initiative, if the Commission does not initiate legislation to protect traditional-national linguistic minorities? The protection of national minorities is a fundamental issue of the rule of law. But if Commissioner Jourova does not want to deal with it and leaves it for Member States to handle, she discredits her own rule of law argument”, the President of the Fidesz-KDNP Delegation to the EP noted.