Prime Minister Resigns On Principle

Not in the UK, you understand, not since Young Dave flounced out after he failed to persuade the electorate to vote Remain in rather larger numbers. We need to move south to Portugal to see what a principled Prime Minister does at the merest suspicion of misconduct. And what António Costa did yesterday was to tender his resignation to President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa.

António Costa - resigned immediately, versus ...

Had he seen out his term in office - after winning re-election in January last year - Costa would have become the country’s longest-serving post Revolutionary PM. But this prospect did not cause him to even hesitate, and here we have a comparison with the UK: Costa had served two terms as Mayor of Lisbon before becoming PM. Who might be the British comparator?

But you knew that already: disgraced former alleged Prime Minister Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson was the name, and hanging on grimly until being forcibly dislodged by his own MPs was the game. No principled act from him, and furthermore, an electorate gaslighted by our free and fearless press was guaranteed, as Bozo declined to go, despite the scandals.

And what scandals they were: Partygate (where he acquired an actual criminal conviction), Wallpapergate, lying to the Queen in order to have Parliament improperly prorogued, the Russia report, the Sue Gray report, the Chris Pincher scandal, the Owen Paterson scandal, his visits to Palazzo Terranova, blaming Keir Starmer over Jimmy Savile, the reign of terror of chief Downing Street polecat Dominic Cummings, and the congenital lying.

On top of that were all the Covid-19 deaths (over which he eventually owned up), the precipitous loss of Tory support leading to several by-election defeats (from which the party has not recovered), meetings with the likes of Steve Bannon, and the image of corruption and dishonesty was inescapable.

No way would Bozo have resigned the Top Job just because an investigation came a little close to him and his pals. But that is what António Costa did, and without being pushed or prompted. As the BBC has reported, he “resigned after investigators searched his official residence in an inquiry into alleged corruption … He said he had not been named as a suspect but believed the inquiry was incompatible with staying in office”. There was more.

... Bozo, who had to be dragged out of No 10 kicking and screaming

“Prosecutors said on Tuesday they were investigating concessions awarded for lithium mines and hydrogen production … They said detention warrants were issued for five people including Mr Costa's chief of staff, Vítor Escária”. Lithium. For electric vehicle batteries. A source within the EU.

That is important, as it keeps the EU independent of countries like China. Anyone else under suspicion? “Infrastructure Minister João Galamba has meanwhile been indicted as part of the inquiry into energy deals”. Galamba has already survived one set of calls for his resignation. There may be a dissolution of the assembly and new elections next January.

Compare and contrast with Bozo, Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak coming along in rapid succession with no reference to the electorate, along with yet more of those by-election losses. Plus the continuing scandal of all those billions spaffed up the wall, to use Bozo’s happy phrase, during the Covid pandemic, with the impression being given of cronyism and potential criminality.

But it is Costa’s response to events that shows the huge gulf in principle between him and Bozo: “The dignity of the functions of prime minister is not compatible with any suspicion about his integrity, his good conduct and even less with the suspicion of the practice of any criminal act … Obviously, I submitted my resignation to the President of the Republic”. Obviously.

Few in the UK would expect a PM to depart the stage at the mere suspicion of impropriety. Our free and fearless press will readily tell anyone not yet asleep that those southern European sorts do lots of corruption and dishonesty, while gaslighting the electorate and smearing anyone who dares to suggest that the Tories are, if anything, a whole lot worse.

Thus the further lesson from Portugal. Rishi Sunak is also not resigning.

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