Parliament again discusses rules of flags after insurance veto

ANDthis diploma was adopted in the overall final vote by the parliamentary right, with the opposition of the benches on the left, but after the veto of the President of the Republic, the PSD announced that it would introduce amendments.

“The PSD will seek to make the amendments to the decree according to the concerns and recommendations of the President of the Republic to then re-present it,” said PSD parliamentary leader Hugo Soares in statements to Lusa and the Public newspaper.

If the decree is amended, the Head of State shall again have all open constitutional possibilities: promulgation, veto or referral to the Constitutional Court.

If the parties wanted to confirm – without amendments – the decree vetoed by the President of the Republic, it would have to be approved again by an absolute majority, and the PSD votes would be necessary.

The CDS-PP initially expressed the intention to confirm the diploma, but also had already admitted opening for “timely changes”, while the president of the Aquida, André Ventura, defended there was a sufficient majority for confirmation.

In the message he sent to Parliament, the President of the Republic justified the veto to the decree on the use of flags in public buildings with the distinction between “humanitarian causes with explicit constitutional and conventional recognition” and “partisan political positions”.

António José Seguro said that he does not know or devalue the “legitimate concerns that will have presided over the legislative initiative, namely to preserve the dignity and neutrality of the institutional spaces of the State”.

“ Nevertheless, it cannot be ignored that the humanitarian causes with constitutional and conventional recognition expressed are placed in a distinct position from the political-party positions, insofar as the State has already made normative commitments to them”, reads the message.

António José Seguro also pointed out the use of “indeterminate concepts, which contribute nothing to the clarity of the law, as well as to its correct application”, considering that the concepts of “ideological banner” and “associative banner” are not defined in the diploma, “allowing speculation and uncertainty about its completion and, of course, about the application, or not, of the legal provisions that are intended to be effective in the legal system”.

The diploma approved by Parliament aims to prohibit the “exhibition, placement or raising” in public buildings of flags “of an ideological, party or associative nature, regardless of their legal nature” and also of “foreign origin, except in the context of official acts of diplomatic or protocol”.

In these buildings, only the national flag, the flag of the European Union, the “institutional and heraldic flags, in particular of State entities, autonomous regions, local authorities and public services and entities, the Armed Forces, security forces and their units” would be allowed.