Here we are in this new year, which begins with new hardships and price increases.

It is so in food, rents, housing loans, tolls, telecommunications, in a list that never stops, and which is always shouldered by the majority of the workers and the population, at the same time that it fills the coffers of economic groups, those for whom there are never difficulties.

This tiny minority, which through the most shameless exploitation and use, leaves behind another spectacular year of record profits, unlike the many who had to cut everything they could to ensure the essentials, those for whom the difficulties and sacrifices continue.

This tiny minority of scandalous profits always has the support of its political instruments, PS, PSD, CDS, Chega and IL, these who seek to deceive and always find justification for not touching the profits of economic groups.

The Christmas hamper in 2023 was practically 10% more expensive than in 2022, when there was still no zero VAT.

In two years, food products increased by 25.3%, a situation that impacts everyone's lives, particularly the poorest, those who spend 46% of their budget on food, in contrast with the richest.

Prices increase, the hardship increases for those who buy but also for small producers, but profits for Sonae, Jerónimo Martins and large retail chains increase.

And this cannot continue like this. Enough of injustices.

They can say whatever they want, invent all the excuses and justifications, but the truth is just one, it is urgent and necessary to respond to the great national emergency: significantly increase the wages, to face the worsening cost of living, but above all, to value those who work, those who produce wealth, those who make the country work.

Increasing wages, valuing workers, careers and professions, this is also necessary to combat injustice, inequality and redistribute more fairly the wealth that is created.

Just as it is urgent to guarantee those who have worked their entire lives the right to age with dignity, starting with an increase in their pensions.

It is necessary to regulate and lower prices, starting with food, and reducing VAT on electricity, gas and telecommunications.

It is necessary to value, respect and retain professionals in the National Health Service and respond to the needs of users

We will present the electoral programme in a few days, with measures that respond to the problems that are there, and right now we can put forward measures that guarantee the constitutional right of access to housing, this essential asset, which is in the hands of the banks and their 12 million of euros of profits per day, of real estate funds, of speculators.

A special regime for the protection of home ownership, which puts banking profits to support the increase in interest rates, also reducing banking fees, commissions and other charges.

A special tenant protection regime, which limits the increase in rents and the value of new leases and restricts eviction situations.

The expansion of the public housing supply through the immediate mobilisation of public properties for housing purposes and reinforced and continuous public investment, with funds from the State Budget, for the construction of more public housing.

We are not giving up on any of these measures, even if they face opposition from PS, PSD, CDS, Chega and IL and challenge the 25 million euros in profits that economic groups make per day.

We are not giving up on measures and solutions that respond to the needs of the workers and people, we are not giving up on the fight for a better life and that means confronting those responsible for the situation we have reached and their interests.

And it's not worth coming up with feigned differences now, because reality shows the opposite.

And the truth is that PS, PSD, CDS, Chega and IL, beyond their express alignment in exploitation, low wages, precariousness, unregulated working times and abuse of shift work, beyond their correct accounts, which disrupt the lives of millions of people, they serve the promiscuity between economic and political power.

And if there were still any doubts, a few days ago they were all trying to adopt lobbying regulations at the eleventh hour.

Beyond the talk, beyond the proclamations, beyond the anti-corruption and transparency vows, in fact, what all of them want is for influence peddling and dealings to become legal. This is not a way to combat corruption, this is an incentive to practice it and a safeguard for those who practice it.

But it is clear why they do it, because they are all aligned in the biggest focus of these shady deals and corruption, which is privatisations.

Witness the current controversy surrounding CTT and the purchase of shares by the Government.

CTT, a public company that gave the State millions of euros and was privatised with the opposition of the PCP, with the usual all in agreement; property is stolen, everyone silent; visible deterioration of the postal service, not a word; workers' rights put at risk, no concern of theirs; post offices and counters closed, has nothing to do with them; postage will increase 9.5% in February, not even a hint of concern; PCP's proposal to recover public control of the company, PS, PSD, CDS, Chega and IL all, all against.

This is the scandal, this is the underlying and revealing problem that MPs working for the Champalimaud group and other capitalists who made millions at the expense of CTT have been in the Assembly of the Republic for too long.

Banks, insurance companies, postal services, telecommunications, energy, airports – privatisations have been a feast for big capital.

Just yesterday the Court of Auditors concluded that the privatisation of ANA, carried out by the PSD/CDS Government and applauded by current Chega and IL leaders, did not defend the public interest. In nine years, the owners of ANA, the French da Vinci, earned 1400 million euros, more than what they had paid for the company. Even worse, if nothing is done, by 2062 this multinational will pocket more than 20 billion euros for its shareholders. Twenty billion that would be enough to build airports, schools, hospitals and that, instead of staying in the country, will add to the bank accounts of some. This is a shame, a crime, an assault on national resources that needs to be denounced and fought.

If the privatisation of airports was a scandal, a bigger scandal would be allowing this assault on the country to continue until 2062, that is, for another 40 years.

The issue that now arises is to end privatisation. The Portuguese State and the Portuguese people have not only the right but the duty to act to recover for the country what should never have been handed over to a multinational. That's what needs to be done, that's what we're going to fight.

And given the seriousness of what has now been revealed, it is also necessary to determine political and criminal responsibilities. It has been confirmed that privatisations are a police matter and a fertile ground where corruption flourishes. Since the Court of Auditors sent this report to the Public Prosecutor's Office, it is necessary to wait for the investigation of criminal responsibilities to be carried out.

On a political level, the PCP right away assumes that, after the elections on March 10, it will take the initiative to propose the creation of a parliamentary commission of inquiry into the privatisation of ANA and will move forward with initiatives to recover public control of airports.

Proclamations and declarations of good intentions are of little value.

What is needed, what decides in everyday life, is the real fight against right-wing policies.

Yes, right-wing policies are our main enemy, wherever they come from.

And it is only possible to guarantee an effective fight against right-wing policies and pave the way to solve the problems by giving more strength to the PCP and the CDU.

What the reality shows is that when the PS gains strength, as the two years of absolute majority reveal, the problems remain unsolved.

And so that there are no illusions, this weekend's PS Congress is, as expected, reaffirming this path of the last two years.

It is the legacy of the absolute majority, which is to be continued, with the results that are in sight; they are the guidelines from Brussels, which should be followed obediently.

It is the correct accounts, the ones that disrupt the lives of millions of people and public services, which are to be continued.

It's all there and also there are no, which is not surprising, concrete options on valuing work and workers, changes to labour legislation, fiscal policy, investment in public services and social functions of the State, redistribution of wealth, the fight against injustice and inequalities.

The PS Congress reveals, among others, three issues: that there is only one PS; that their fundamental options are clear and that all this further reinforces the need for the PCP and the CDU to have more votes and more MPs.

Giving strength to the PS is giving votes to an illusion, in the same way that voting for the PSD and CDS or for those who will come from them, Chega and IL, means going backwards. We know what they want, we know their project and objectives.

From them we will only have setbacks, only demagoguery and the intensification of difficulties, injustices and problems.

This is the challenge facing all democrats, all patriots, all who live and work here, all who for this or that reason are rightly discontented and outraged, all who, regardless of their vote two years ago, now realise that the only way to have a policy at their service, a policy that corresponds to their interests, is really and only by reinforcing, also at the electoral level, the PCP and the CDU.

More votes and more MPs are needed, the CDU is the strength of the Given Word, Dignity and Trust.

We will not give up, as we have never given up, policies that correspond to the wishes and rights of the workers and populations, we will be there taking the initiative of solutions for a better life, in the same way that we will be on the front line of the fight against everything that is negative, wherever it comes from.

This is the guarantee that each and every one can count with their vote for the CDU.

Here we are in a new year, with challenges and demands, but also with great opportunities and potential.

Two months away from the elections, an opportunity is open to strengthen the PCP, the CDU and the path to the better life to which we are entitled.

The workers and the people, with their struggle and their vote, will give more strength and elect more CDU MPs.

“They can decree the end of art, that’s like decreeing the end of rain.”

They can spread all the opinion polls, all the scenarios, they can try to make the debate come down to exchanging pleasantries, imaginary scenarios, they can avoid debating the contents, they can come with pressure and blackmail, don’t count on the PCP for these manoeuvres.

“What is the content and what is the project, what is the policy, and above all, who does it serve?”

This is the answer that everyone needs to give.

The PCP was not, is not and will not be the icing on the cake of the policy that squeezes the majority and opens the doors to economic groups, for that, no thanks, for that, those who want it can cast their vote on the various options that exist and that elect those MPs who serve CTT, banks, Galp, EDP, Jerónimo Martins or the European Central Bank.

The CDU only depends on the people, the workers, the democrats and everyone who wants a better life.

It is the force that counts, the guarantor of the fight against right-wing policies and it is in the strengthening of the CDU that lies the solution to determine the future path, this is the question facing everyone, even voters of other political forces.

The workers and the people know that when the PCP and the CDU gain strength, everyone's life improves and moves forward.

It is this need that will be expressed in the vote of those who feel rightly wronged, outraged and even betrayed.

The vote of those who rightly have reasons to protest and want to express their outrage at injustices have the CDU as a coherent option, this is where that protest is combined with necessary solutions, this is where discontent gains the strength of an alternative and the construction of a better life.

The outrage and protest will be even more valuable with the vote for the CDU, the force that rejects and fights injustices, the force that does not say one thing today and then do another tomorrow, the force of solutions for a Portugal with a future.

The vote of the worker, the vote of each one of us, the vote of each user, the vote of those who are distressed with housing loans and rents, the vote of micro, small and medium-sized entrepreneurs and producers, the vote of pensioners, of young people, of immigrants, is worth as much as that of the owners of GALP, Pingo Doce, CTT, but it could be worth even more if it is not put in the same bag of those who think they are the owners of all this.

The country is not poor but has been impoverished, the country has resources, it has means, the country has upright and honest people, upright and honest people with the will and strength to make this move forward.

With confidence, courage, determination and joy, may each and every one of us be a campaigner for the contact and clarification, that is necessary.

We are carrying out a major broad clarification action.

But we have to do even more, each one of us is and has to be a militant of clarification, has to be an activist of reason and hope, we have to face this battle in terms of what is decisive, an action that is worth more with the talk that we are having and will have, than by the number of documents that we will distribute.

Let's go out there and talk, in companies, in the streets, in cafes, let's talk to everyone and if we do so, we will give hope, pave the way for the solutions that the country needs.

Let's listen, let's propose and counter propose, let's build solutions and a great election result for the CDU to value work and workers, to put the country back on the track of April, this April that marks our history and whose values are essential for the future of Portugal.

That ensures Public Schools and access to housing.

That guarantees rights for parents and children.

A path that is in the hands of everyone and each one of us.

This is the everyday option and also in the upcoming elections.

More strength for the PCP and the CDU is strength to combat regression, defend rights and improve living conditions.

Each time the PCP and CDU advance, the possibilities of a better life for each and every one are reinforced.

We want and will surely build that better life to which we are all entitled.

On the horizon of 2024, in the face of the problems facing the world, we express our confidence in their overcoming and wish peace and social progress for all peoples.