Marcelo warns that he may veto the extinction of the FCT if he has doubts “about any point”

The President of the Republic said today that if he has doubts "about any point" in the extinction of the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT), he will ask the Government to reconsider the legislation and, if the executive insists, he can veto it.

"If I think it's a good idea (...) I'll enact it without any anguish or hesitation. If I have doubts about a single point in this legislation that's very important, I'll ask the government to reconsider. This has happened several times. I might not veto it right away, (...) later, if the government insists, I might veto it, if it's before the end of my term," stated Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa.

The President of the Republic was speaking to journalists in Horta, on the island of Faial, Azores, after a visit to Okeanos – Institute of Research in Marine Sciences, about the reform in the Ministry of Education, Science and Innovation announced this Thursday which includes the extinction of several entities, including the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT), which will be integrated into new agencies.

Marcelo stressed that the "other side of reality" of State reform must be considered, in which, for example, "pure extinction, in itself, may not be a good idea", recalling the case of SEF in which there were "consecutive postponements" in which "the number of entities" "doing what SEF did" increased.

The President recalled that he had been a member of the FCT jury and said that the foundation "had many aspects that deserved to be rethought" because it is "a very old structure", adding, in another response, that "it is an advantage for people to deal with issues they know" and warning of the risk of "creating a mess to solve a problem that is understood to need to be solved".

The reform of the Ministry of Education, Science and Innovation (MECI) was approved by the Council of Ministers and, in a press conference at the end of the meeting, the minister in charge, Fernando Alexandre, justified the restructuring by describing his ministry as an “anachronistic structure”, with fragmented organizations, disintegrated information systems and disjointed governance.

The Academic Association of the University of Lisbon (AAUL) criticized the extinction of the Foundation for Science and Technology, expressing concern about the continuity and stability of ongoing projects, and the National Education Federation (FNE) has already requested an urgent meeting so that the Government can provide clarifications on the measures.