Ex-president says Portugal too dependent on community funds

A former PSD prime minister and president of Portugal, Ánibal Cavaco Silva, says Portugal should not be giving priority to attracting high amounts of community funds.

On the 40th anniversary of Portugal joining the EEC on 1st January, 1986, he said that 40 years after joining the economic community Portugal should now no longer be thinking about attracting a high amount of community funding.

“Portugal today is clearly a better country”, he added, but warned that the priority could not now be about getting community funds.

In an article sent to the Lusa agency on January 1, 2026 addressing the 40th anniversary of Portugal’s joining the EEC as it then was, he said: “Today, Portugal should is in the first line of defence in creating a new ambition to make the European Union and its core solid, the Euro Zone stronger, more cohesion and more visible”.

The ex-president of Portugal remarks in this context that it (The EU) must have a deeper internal market, the creation of a capital markets union, and a European energy union, the completion of a banking union, and the expansion of investment in research and innovation, and innovation for the market.

Cavaco Silva added that the “European Union is confronted by a series of external threats that can only be met if it is truly united in its democratic values and principles that guided its founding”.