The CEO of Portugal’s national flag carrier, Christine Ourmières-Widener, will testify in parliament next Wednesday, following a mandatory request from the conservative Chega party over a controversial golden handshake.
The Chega party want Ourmières-Widener to provide explanations regarding a €500,000 golden handshake paid to Reis, who was later appointed secretary of state for the treasury, and who resigned when details of the payout were known.
According to the agenda of the committee on economy, public works, planning and housing, which was posted on the parliament’s website, Ourmières-Widener is to testify at a hearing scheduled for 18 January from 10.30 am.
On Monday, the leader of the far-right Chega party, André Ventura, announced that it would call the airline’s CEO into parliament to explain the payout to Alexandra Reis when she stepped down early as a company director.
That was after the governing Socialist Party (PS) rejected Chega’s initial proposal for such a hearing. It has already said that it would back a parliamentary committee of inquiry into TAP, proposed by the Left Bloc (BE).
“Chega considers that the moment has come to request a hearing for the CEO of TAP, Christine Ourmières-Widener, so that Parliament can finally reach the truth that is so necessary to clear up the fog surrounding this whole affair,” reads the party’s latest request.
Finance Minister Fernando Medina, Reis’s former boss, was in parliament on Friday to testify on what he knew about the case. That was after the minister of infrastructure and housing, Pedro Nuno Santos, resigned, acknowledging that he had known about the TAP payout.
On Wednesday, in a parliamentary debate, Prime Minister António Costa said that Reis had violated the rules for public managers when she was appointed to the air traffic regulator, NAV, without returning part of the payout she had received from TAP.
(Francisca Matos | Lusa.pt)
Source: euractiv.com
