Defense Minister says he lived “24 hours of parallel reality” due to “falsehood”

The Minister of National Defense, Nuno Melo, said this Thursday that he had lived “24 hours of parallel reality” because of “a falsehood that was in the news” and denied having proposed the recruitment of young delinquents.

“I lived 24 hours of parallel reality, with a falsehood made news and then comments for 24 hours on that news, a minister confronted with what I never proposed, the president [da República] confronting what I never announced and here we go, until the moment when the clarification was finally given”, stated Nuno Melo.

Speaking to journalists, in Beja, on the sidelines of the visit he is making this afternoon to the Ovibeja agricultural fair, the minister assured that, “never, at any time, particularly at Universidade Europa”, proposed “the recruitment of people serving sentences, delinquents, whatever justified very exotic titles that, for 24 hours”, he saw in the media.

“Just to make it clear at the beginning of the conversation, the Minister of Defense, who happens to be me, has never proposed anything even similar. In fact, I did not propose anything, I did not present a proposal, I did not present a study, I did not present an intention not even,” he insisted.

At a conference dinner at the 13th edition of Universidade Europa, last Friday, Nuno Melo argued that military service could be an alternative for young people who commit petty crimes instead of being placed in institutions that, “in most cases , only function as a school of crime for life”.

“How many of these young people who, instead of being institutionalized without any conditions, could carry out military service, have the opportunity to exercise training, authority, values, could not later be much better citizens and they simply were not given this opportunity?”, he asked at the time.

In statements made to journalists today, in Ovibeja, Nuno Melo stressed that he limited himself to giving “an answer through a rhetorical question to a student”, within the scope of that session at the university, regarding “what the armed forces can also do in relation to students or people in a disadvantaged context “.

But what happened was that “we had 24 hours of a falsehood turned into news and the comments surrounding the falsehood and not what I said, which is a shame, because what I said is recorded by all the television stations and what I said, it’s not even close to what was reported”, he reiterated.

Nuno Melo said he was “very pleased” with the requests presented to the Assembly of the Republic for him to provide clarifications precisely there, before parliament, which he highlighted that he would do “with great pleasure”.

“I myself was a deputy and, therefore, I will be there, with great pleasure, giving explanations about all this, Not now, not now. The explanations I will give will be to the deputies in the motherhouse of democracy”, he stated, guaranteeing that he will respond to all the questions that the deputies put to him “without exception”.

The Minister of National Defense also defended that, “much more than justifying or commenting” on what he “never said”, what “really should be evaluated is how what happened 48 hours ago can happen in a consolidated democracy”.