Welcome to the Official page of the Presidency of the Portuguese Republic

Honourable President of the Federal Republic of Brazil, dear Friend,
Honourable Governor of the State of Rio de Janeiro,
Honourable Ministers,
Honourable Members of Parliament,
Honourable Mayor of Rio de Janeiro,
Honourable Authorities,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

I wish, before anything else, to thank President Lula da Silva for his kind words, with which I am very touched.

It was with great pleasure that I accepted the honourable invitation you sent me, Mister President, to take part in the Commemorations promoted by Brazil to celebrate the Bicentenary of the Arrival of the Royal Family in Brazil. I am extremely pleased to be able, today, with Your Excellency, to officially open this Exhibition which, joining institutions of both sides of the Atlantic, so well underlines the relevance of this fact for the History of both our countries.

I would like to pay tribute to all who made this Exhibition possible. Please allow me a word of special recognition for the dedication and professionalism of the Director of this magnificent Museum, Dr. Vera Tostes, and of sincere thanks to the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, represented here by its President.

Excellencies,

A little over two hundred years ago, a popular expression was born, which we still share all over the Portuguese speaking world: “watch the ships sailing away”. This is how the people described what happened to the French General Junot and his troops when, entering the gates of Lisbon they saw, surprised and incredulous, what had just happened: in a gesture without precedent in History, the greater part of the Establishment of the oldest country in Europe, headed by its Royal Family, was sailing off to the lands of the Americas.

Two centuries past, recognition is justly given today to the political boldness and strategic vision of such a decision. A complex decision which anyway implied planning and organization difficult to understand, knowing that it had all been decided and executed in a very few days.

Some may perhaps say that the results arrived at were not those envisaged by King João VI. After all, if he had wished to guarantee the indissolubility of the Portuguese Empire, he ended up associated with the creation of structures and the flowering of patriotic convictions, which would eventually be the origin of the birth of another empire, Brazilian, independent and sovereign. Had he wished to preserve his vision of royal power, he ended up as the prime mover of the birth of constitutional monarchy.

In an endeavour to summarize his works in these lands, Raymundo Faoro quoted Hipólito da Costa, using the mischievous terms of Eça de Queiroz, to say that King João had transferred to Brazil “the Lisbon Almanac”. Quite a notable “Almanac” that, with all its qualities and all its faults, while guaranteeing Portugal’s independence, ensured Brazil’s integrity and, with it, an inescapable role in the international stage, in addition to having allowed that the birth of this great nation be based on the structures essential for the running of the State!

King João VI deeply loved this land, assuming with his whole being the title of Prince of Brazil with which he had arrived. Here he was acclaimed King and, nearby in Outeiro da Glória, dedicated his grandchildren to Our Lady, the future King Pedro II of Brazil and Queen Maria II, of Portugal – the first Head of State of a European country born in one of its colonies, a condition which she shared, in some way, with Bernardino Machado, a Portuguese President of the Republic, also a son of Brazil.

King João VI loved this land, to the point of not wanting to leave it, in the presence of a Parliament that, exasperated, ordered his return and decided that never again could a Portuguese Head of State leave the country without its consent. A rule which has been maintained, and meaning, in this case, that I am the only Portuguese citizen that requires Parliamentary authority to cross the border. This was what I had to do, to be able to be here with Your Excellency, Mister President, and with you all. Thus the long reach of the influence of King João VI!

I believe that when he returned to Lisbon, sad and against his will as is reported, King João VI brought with him that very Portuguese feeling that Brazil is bewitching: not being just one thing, or another, to be Brazilian in Portugal, and to be Portuguese in Brazil. That feeling which makes what separates us seem so small, because what links us is so much more in evidence.

Mister President,

In the world we live in, the much that links us has a strategic value and demands that we be ambitious for the future. That will be the best way to be deserving of our History.

Sharing the same values and the same language, and communing of a vast number of interests, justifies an ever closer coordination of positions between our two countries, both bilaterally and in the international stage.

I never had any doubts as to this. In 1991 I had the honour, as Prime Minister, to be at the origin of the Summits between Portugal and Brazil, an institutional framework which reflects this common purpose and on which our relations are based nowadays.

Recognition must be given to the progress which our relationship has known in the latter years, which includes very significant issues that, allied to the actions of a Portuguese and Luso-Brazilian community for whom Brazil has been home for many years, has contributed towards the progress of this land and honouring, with it, the name of Portugal.

We are however still far from what legitimately could be expected from the relationship between two countries such as ours.

Everything that may contribute to bring us nearer must be enhanced: cultural, artistic and academic interchange, scientific and technological cooperation, trade, tourist and investment flows, contacts between the institutions in which our civic societies are structured. The States have a determining role here, to promote and facilitate this movement.

It is also necessary to deepen our political understanding and project it with more determination on the international stage, whenever our common interests so justify.

Immediately, gaining advantage from the synergies offered by the partnership with our African and Asian sister Nations, which are included with us in the Community of Portuguese Speaking Countries, the dream and ambition of that great Brazilian to whom I want to pay a sincere tribute here, Ambassador José Aparecido de Oliveira.

And, if there is an example of strategic interest which we share with our partners in CPSP, where the need for this understanding and partnership is in greater evidence, this example is the valuation and international projection of the Portuguese language, of which Brazil is the greater exponent.

Another framework where this partnership can and should assert itself is that of our respective insertion in Mercosur and in the European Union. The approximation between both institutions is in our common interest since, the greater it is, more relevant will be our role in each of them.

For this reason we have been defending, since the beginning of our adhesion, the institutionalizing of relations between Mercosur and the European Union, and promoted the first meeting between the two blocks during our Presidency of the Union, in 1992. This is why we are also defending, with firm initiatives, the overcoming of obstacles to the enactment of an Association Agreement between the European Union and Mercosur. This is why we tried so hard to constitute a Strategic Partnership between Brazil and the European Union, as recently agreed in Lisbon, during our Presidency of the Union.

Partnership and agreement, also, within the Iberian-American environment, since it is important for Portugal and Brazil that value is awarded, in this context, to what distinguishes us from the others, an objective which depends upon a close liaison in the diplomatic actions of our two countries.

In the face of all these examples relating to fields where agreement between our diplomatic machines is necessary in our common interest, is it not the time to achieve a closer cooperation between our Diplomatic Training Institutions, the Rio Branco Institute of Brazil and the Diplomatic Institute of Portugal?

Would not now be the time to go ahead with interchange programmes similar to those that already exist between many other countries with much lesser ties than ours, bringing Portuguese diplomats for lengthy periods in the Itamaraty and taking Brazilian diplomats to the Palace of Necessidades? And why not name this Programme after that Luso-Brazilian visionary, whose 4th centenary we are celebrating this year, Father António Vieira?

Mister President,

In this day when we both celebrate an episode of our common History, after which none of our countries continued to be the same; in the presence of this notable Exhibition, and having in mind all the events which congregated Portuguese and Brazilians commemorating this event, this is the message, the ambition which I want to put forward: that we know how to bring about, with History’s legacy, a project for the future that may benefit the generations which will come in our stead.

Thank you very much