The reforms that Portugal is still waiting for

The Portuguese Government rose to power a little more than a year ago. And with a clear mission ahead – to kick start and deploy a number of urgent and much needed political and economic reforms, the only way to actually step out of the current hazardous situation. A huge task – and one that takes long. Still, one year into the term, results are disappointing:

-                  - Public Administration reform – still too departments, many of them with blurred competences – still, a number of them have been identified and extinguished, so, that is a start. But still, there isn’t a clear individual performance system in place and no clear incentive to excel while working for the State; there are still too many people working directly for the State. Public Administration is still overburdening the economic with inefficient spend and bureaucracy

-           - Judicial reform – part of it is underway, with the new judicial map. But a simplification of judicial procedures is still to be put in place, resulting in too much bureaucracy, too much time for sentences to be applied and an impunity sentiment.

-                  -Corruption – nothing is being done on this area and there are disturbing signs that the current Government is actually following the same trend as previous ones

-            - Too much state in the economy – encouraging signs with  the privatization of several companies already listed, but 2 huge problems remain: 1) a number of too important and big companies still don’t have a clear profitability model that allows for their privatization and are overburdening the State deficit (namely transportation and hospitals); 2) obscure municipal companies still exist, without any clear purpose as to provide jobs for “party boys”

-                 - No clear economic strategy – that would integrate a number of other areas (namely education) and would drive hard choices, economy and employment.

When these areas are handled, then I can start talking about others – as, believe me, there is much to be done in terms of State efficiency in Portugal. But, by now, whoever is able to actually handle the 5 reforms I have listed above, will have my vote and confidence. I believe they are the areas we should now be focusing on.