On this 24-hour trip to Sao Tome and Principe, Antonio Costa will be accompanied by the Minister of National Defense, João Gómez Cravinho, the Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces, Antonio Silva Ribeiro, and the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs W. Collaboration, Francisco Andre.
The head of the Portuguese executive is expected to arrive in Sao Tome in the early afternoon, and immediately thereafter have meetings with his counterpart, Jorge Bom Jesus, and with the President of the Republic, Carlos Villa Nova.
After the institutional meetings, Antonio Costa will travel to the Portuguese Navy’s patrol ship Zaire, which since 2018 has been on assignment in Sao Tome and Principe, under a bilateral agreement.
In several public interventions, as in the last NATO Parliamentary Assembly, which was held in Lisbon, the Prime Minister warned of the urgent need to strengthen defenses in the Gulf of Guinea, with the aim of combating piracy and maintaining maritime security.
This Zairean patrol ship, operated by a mixed garrison, currently comprising 23 Portuguese and 13 São Toméan soldiers, has key tasks to contribute to the formation of the São Toméan Coast Guard, and to enhance surveillance and inspection of this country’s maritime spaces and security in the Gulf of Guinea region.
In the late afternoon, Antonio Costa visited the Central Hospital in Sao Tome, which is part of the “Health for All” cooperation project, launched in 1988 and considered one of the most important projects in Portuguese cooperation.
According to a national diplomatic source, this program aims to enhance access, equity and efficiency in the provision of health care and employment in the country’s health centers, as well as in the Central Hospital of Sao Tome and Hospital do Principe.
With regard to the fight against Covid-19, Portugal has already donated 86,000 doses of vaccines in three different batches – one out of 12 thousand and two out of 37 thousand – accompanied by materials needed for the vaccination.
The last point of the Prime Minister’s program in Sao Tome will be a Christmas dinner with Portuguese soldiers, in Espaco Cacao, where Sao Tome’s Minister of National Defense will also attend.
Regarding bilateral relations, on 2 October this year, the Portuguese Head of State, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, attended the inauguration of Carlos Vila Nova as President of the Democratic Republic of Sao Tome and Principe.
On that occasion, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, speaking to reporters, said he had invited the new President of Sao Tome, Carlos Vila Nova, to visit Portugal and announced that the Prime Minister, Antonio Costa, would visit Sao Tome and Principe until the end of this year.
On that same voyage, the President of the Republic was also on board the Portuguese Navy’s patrol ship Zaire.
Before the mixed garrison in Zaire, which includes about two-thirds of the Portuguese soldiers and one-third of the population of Sao Tome, the head of state left a message of “gratitude” and expressed “his confidence in a mission that will not stop, will not stop and will continue and is a prestigious position for two sister nations”.
PMF (IEL) // SF
Lusa / end
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