Chega MP Rita Matias was identified by police following Monday’s disruption of a live broadcast at Rádio Universidade de Coimbra (RUC), a university radio station based in Coimbra, the PSP has confirmed.
A spokesperson for the Coimbra District PSP Command told Lusa that Matias was identified “as the person responsible for a demonstration that did not comply with the legal requirements”.
She was the only member of the Chega group identified by police, despite fellow MP Madalena Cordeiro also being among those who entered the RUC studio.
Officers asked the group to leave the premises after arriving at the headquarters of the Associação Académica de Coimbra (AAC), where the radio station is based, and they complied with the request. A vice-president of the AAC was also identified by police as the person who had called them to the scene.
The incident unfolded on Monday morning during the first edition of RUC political debate programme Ampulheta.
Chega had been invited to participate remotely because of an AAC decision, approved at a general assembly in February, barring party representatives from its premises and events.
Instead, a Chega delegation entered the building during the programme. RUC says Matias and Cordeiro entered the studio while the debate was being broadcast live, with the transmission eventually being interrupted.
Matias defends protest
Matias has defended the action, arguing that Chega had been placed at an unfair disadvantage after being invited to participate in RUC’s political debate only remotely, while representatives of other party youth organisations were present in the studio.
Speaking to Lusa after Monday’s incident, she described the conditions offered to Chega as “offensive”, saying they did not allow all political youth organisations to take part “on equal terms”.
“It was in that sense that we went there physically, to demonstrate that not only are we able to be physically present in these spaces, but that we are available to debate ideas,” she said.
Matias also rejected the AAC decision barring Chega representatives from the building, describing it as “neither democratic nor constitutional”, and said the party’s challenge to the measure “does not stop here”.
She denied taking a microphone away from another participant and said Chega’s intention had simply been to contribute to the debate. Matias also insisted that the group had no intention of taking over the radio station or preventing its normal broadcast, saying its dispute was with the AAC rather than RUC itself.
In a video published by the party following the incident, Matias described Chega as “uncancellable”, saying that after being prevented from attending the debate physically, the group had decided to go to the premises to make its case.
Journalists’ Union calls for investigation
The fallout continued on Tuesday, with Portugal’s Journalists’ Union (SJ) condemning the incident and arguing that the interruption amounted to a criminal offence.
The SJ said it expects the Public Prosecutor’s Office to open an investigation and also called for possible action by Parliament’s Integrity Committee regarding the two MPs.
Meanwhile, the Student Associative Movement (MAE) has written to Chega leader André Ventura seeking explanations over the incident.
The letter is backed by academic associations from universities including the Algarve, Coimbra, Aveiro, Évora and Minho, as well as student federations in Lisbon and Porto.
The organisations said the forced interruption of a live radio broadcast raised “serious concerns” surrounding protections for freedom of programming and information.