Portugal: racism in the election campaign?
Portugal will hold a snap parliamentary election on 10 March. At an event organised by the centre-right Aliança Democrática (AD), former prime minister Pedro Passos Coelho dropped a political bombshell: he linked the increase in immigration to an alleged decline in people's sense of safety. But there are no statistics pointing to an increase in crime. The press is divided on whether this is a viable tactic to win votes.
Don't leave thorny issues to the far-right
For Correio da Manhã, it was an attempt that should be welcomed:
“Passos Coelho uttered a few banal words about security and immigration and all hell broke lose. The Left has shoved him into the far-right corner and calls him ignorant. But the truth is that he has raised two topics that until now have been left to the Chega party. AD and the socialists need to stop being scared of addressing these issues. ... Not by drawing links between criminality and immigration, because there is no evidence of such a connection. ... But they must build a broad consensus regarding inclusive public policies on immigration and security.”
Risking violence against migrants
This is a dangerous way to start a debate, counters the journalist Pedro Tadeu in Diário de Notícias:
“Passos Coelho never struck me as racist or xenophobic, but when it comes to political issues that fuel racism, responsible politicians must always act in a way that is instructive, truthful and reduces tensions. ... He did not do this. A responsible politician should never draw associations between immigration and crime without providing objective data, because this runs the risk of provoking the very crime he claims to want to prevent: in other European countries, such rhetoric has already provoked deadly violence against immigrants on several occasions.”