Heard in the context of the Operation Marquês corruption trial, André Figueiredo explained to the court that he met the former prime minister in the Socialist Party (PS), where he was a leading figure during José Sócrates’ leadership, with whom he maintained personal and professional relations after leaving office.
In 2013, he was involved in promoting the book “A Confiança no Mundo” (Trust in the World), describing himself as “ultimately responsible” for organising the various presentation events, and admitted that the launch of the book was part of a communication strategy aimed at presenting José Sócrates’ candidacy for the presidency.
In one of the many telephone wiretaps played during the trial, José Sócrates asks his friend, “Is that operation already underway?”
The “operation”, André Figueiredo clarified, did not refer to a possible strategy to buy thousands of copies – which the former collaborator said he was unaware of until he was questioned by the public prosecutor’s office – but to contacts with PS leaders to “set up the machine” for collecting proposals within the scope of that candidacy.
The launch of the book, along with the programme he had at the time on state broadcaster RTP, served as a kind of launch pad for this objective and, therefore, André Figueiredo’s concern was to ensure that the presentation sessions would be a success.
“Failures in mobilising and publicising events where José Sócrates was the main figure would be catastrophic for the start of anything,” he stressed, also referring to a seasonal greeting card sent that year by email to around 50,000 contacts, some of which were provided by Carlos Santos Silva, thus justifying a meeting that was scheduled but never took place with the businessman, with whom André Figueiredo said he had met on occasion but about whom he knew little.
André Figueiredo was also questioned by prosecutors about the involvement of other authors in the writing of the book and admitted that José Sócrates shared the chapters to gather contributions (Leonardo Negrão / Global Imagens)
Confronted with several wiretaps of telephone conversations with José Sócrates, André Figueiredo was forced to decode several terms used by the former prime minister – such as when Sócrates says that “that is to clog up” allegedly referring to registrations for the book sessions, or “the letter F”, referring to Fernanda Câncio (Socrates’ ex-girlfriend) – leading the judges to question the enigmatic content of the conversations.
“I think we were always very afraid. Even during the government’s time, we didn’t have very open conversations about political strategy on the phone. We were often warned – and we’re not talking about the justice system – that there was always a lot of interest in being able to intercept communications within the hard core of the PS and São Bento (the PM’s official residence in Lisbon). The issue of the Presidency even more so,” he explained.
André Figueiredo was also questioned by prosecutors about the involvement of other authors in the writing of the book and admitted that José Sócrates shared the chapters to gather contributions, with the former collaborator even taking manuscripts to fellow socialist MPs in the parliament and other personalities, including Santos Silva.
Regarding his role in purchasing copies, André Figueiredo confirmed that he had bought dozens of books, but always in the context of presentation sessions and at the request of some people who asked him for autographed copies, insisting that he was unaware of Sócrates’ concern about sales.
For the witness, for the purposes of promoting José Sócrates’ image, the success of the presentation sessions was more important than the sales figures.
In the Operation Marquês case, José Sócrates, 67, is charged (indicted after investigation) with 22 crimes, including three counts of corruption, for allegedly receiving money to benefit the Lena civil construction group, the Espírito Santo Group (GES) and the Algarve resort of Vale do Lobo in separate cases.
In total, the case involves 21 official suspects, who have generally denied committing the 117 economic and financial crimes with which they are charged. The trial has been ongoing since 3 July at the Central Criminal Court in Lisbon.
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