Jorge Botelho, Secretary of State for Decentralization and Local Administration, and his wife Margarida Flores, the regional director of the Social Security Institute, will proceed with criminal defamation lawsuits against Ana Rita Cavaco, president of the Ordem dos Enfermeiros, due to a post on Facebook where she claimed that the couple, as well as other family members, had been vaccinated against Covid-19, something the Government member says is "totally false".
“Neither I, nor my wife, nor any member of our family was vaccinated against Covid-19. My friends, as far as I know, did not go either», he told the Sul Informação Jorge Botelho, who added that "the process is being prepared, to be filed with the court in the next few days".
In parallel, Margarida Flores is preparing her own action, independent of her husband's, bearing in mind that both were personally and professionally targeted in the publication.
On Saturday night, Ana Rita Cavaco made a post in which he claimed to have heard that Margarida Flores "caught her, they say, from her family and some socialist friends, and plays the part of lines and smart guys to get the vaccine."
«If so, the amount of frets per square meter in the country, which is tiny, is unbearable! Oh hideous creatures, fine flower of the rubble! Who are these, my God?” he wrote.
All this was associated with news about the controversy of vaccines given by INEM Norte to workers in a house in Francesinhas.
Speaking to our newspaper, Jorge Botelho said he called Ana Rita Cavaco to clarify that the insinuation he made was a lie, asking her to withdraw the post, as it was false.
However, Ana Rita Cavaco did not do so and added a sentence to her original post: «However, HE Jorge Botelho called me now, now I have fixed the name, saying that he was not vaccinated, neither he nor his wife, but that he has criteria to be. He was upset by what people say. I thought I should put your position here but I confess I was confused, it wasn't but it has criteria. I remembered something else too, the criterion in this country for having a high public office, family», it reads.
The member of the Government, a lawyer by training, argues that, not only in the original post, but also in the sentence added later, there is matter that constitutes “aggravated defamation”. He even says that “an association was made with a concept of family to which I do not accept being linked”.
As for the question of criteria, it has to do with the fact that Jorge Botelho has a cardiovascular disease, in addition to being asthmatic. «As many people know, on the 11th of May I had a myocardial infarction, which caused them to put some stents in the “machine”, he recalled.
Still, Jorge Botelho says he has no other intention than to wait for his turn to be vaccinated. “When called by the Health Authorities, I will go and be vaccinated. But I will do nothing to be vaccinated before that», he said.
Margarida Flores also told the Sul Informação, that he was preparing a lawsuit against Ana Rita Cavaco for defamation.
The director of Social Security in the Algarve had already made a public statement, also on Facebook, informing “those who are curious” that she had not been vaccinated, as was “no one in my household”.
However, the Social Security Institute went public to guarantee that the information about the alleged vaccination of Margarida Flores and her family «is totally false and its disclosure is intended to call into question the honesty of the leader, who was not administered any dose. of the vaccine in question'.
Also the PS of Tavira, through its president João Pedro Rodrigues, councilor in the Tavirense Chamber, which until recently was presided over by Jorge Botelho, reacted to the controversy.
«PS Tavira vehemently repudiates the completely gratuitous and unfounded statements that the President of the Ordem dos Enfermeiros made about the putative vaccination of the Director of Social Security in Faro, Margarida Flores, and the Secretary of State for Decentralization and Local Administration, Jorge Botelho, a situation immediately denied by themselves», reads a note from the party.
Socialists speak of "false news" that drag "into the "mud" the names of people who dedicate their lives, with high competence and availability, to the public cause, more specifically in the fight against the pandemic."
«This lady, instead of spreading falsehoods, should go to the front line, fight the pandemic, as the Portuguese nurses do, to whom I leave public recognition. At the very least, a public apology is required from those targeted for the lack of respect and seriousness», concluded João Pedro Rodrigues.
Help us to do the Sul Informação!
Contribute your donation so that we can continue to make your journal!
Click here to support us (Paypal)
Or use our IBAN PT50 0018 0003 38929600020 44
Comments