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On Tuesday, the President of the Republic asked if the state had no duty to intervene in the face of the media crisis, considering that there is an "emergency situation" "which is already a problem of democracy and regime. "The big question I asked myself is: how far does the state have any obligation to intervene?" Said Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa at the ceremony Gazeta 2017 Awards at a hotel in Lisbon.
The head of state said that in this regard, he had considered whether "a form of cross-border parliamentary intervention would not be possible and would correspond to a regime agreement". "I do not really want to end my presidential term with the feeling of having coincided with a dramatic period of the deep crisis of the media in Portugal, of freedom in Portugal and therefore of democracy in Portugal", he adds.
With regard to possible state intervention, "even if it is to help financially and economically to find decisions or measures to minimize this type of crisis", the President The Republic stated that the matter initially raised reservations. "This is the risk – we have this memory, the oldest – of, when to intervene, put the hand and be tempted to abuse," said Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa.
He then considered the possibility of "a form of transversal intervention" or "small measures" such as "postage, for example", highlighting its impact on the regional and local press. "It was not a scandalous intervention, however," he said.
The President of the Republic has also launched as an intervention hypothesis "to study what is done abroad" vis-à-vis the "major multinational platforms" that use the content of the Portuguese media ", while it is a very unequal struggle, compensation for what is done here and who should be paid."
Addressing the winners and other journalists present in the room, he said: "This time it's a time of resistance, you have to resist to be able to win, I'll see what I can do to help this resistance, but only to resist. " go win. "According to the head of state, there is a" media emergency situation in Portugal "which" worsens year by year ", on the radio, in the press, on television, and that "creates already democratic problems, regime problems".
Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa warned that "the eruption of what is called, for simplicity, populism and other phenomena of the kind, as well as the economic and social causes that contribute to it", is also based on "the current growing weakness of social communication", is, basically, "the growing weakness of democracy". "And the Portuguese democracy, which has resisted more than other democracies, even close, must also resist in this area, before a populist call appears, which suddenly channels discontent, protest, repression, resentment, and resilience of democracy and freedom to the challenge, "he warned. "It is worth resisting, for journalism, for freedom, for democracy in Portugal," he concluded.
In the first part of his speech, the head of state said that even though he had never had a professional journalist portfolio, he had worked or collaborated with the following media: " Século, capital, Diário de Lisboa, Diário Popular, Bola, to make a crazy cover in a championship, Expresso, of course, Weekly, Messenger of Bragança, Diário de Coimbra, Jornal da Costa do Sol. "" Television: TVI, RTP SIC, it's true, just for tennis, but I still managed to work for CIS, "he added. express the desire of these times.
At this ceremony, the 2017 Gazeta Awards were presented to Adriano Miranda, Público (Photography), Joana Gorjão Henriques, Público (Press), João Santos Duarte and Tiago Miranda, Expresso (Multimedia), Cláudia Arsénio, TSF (Radio). Pedro Coelho, SIC (Television) and Margarida David Cardoso, from Público (Revelação). Luís Filipe Costa received the Gazeta de Merito and the newspaper Correio da Feira received the Gazeta Regional Award.
These awards are an initiative of the Journalists Club, sponsored by Santander Totta and Galp Energia.
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