Fury in Portugal as hundreds protest ‘unlawful and uncontrolled’ immigration

The demonstrators marched behind banners demanding the “finish of mass immigration” and the expulsion of immigrants responsible of crimes on the protest referred to as by the far-right Chega social gathering, the nation’s third-largest political drive.

Immigration is “superb” however “guidelines are wanted,” mentioned Cecilia Guimaraes, a 66-year-old instructor whose mother and father emigrated to Canada.

“We emigrated legally. That’s the way it ought to occur in a developed nation,” she informed AFP, complaining of an increase in insecurity she fears is linked to international arrivals.

Chega lawmaker Rui Afonso mentioned Portugal and different European international locations had been unable to manage entries, which generated a “feeling of insecurity” as a result of “we don’t know their previous”.

Afonso added that European nations had been ill-equipped to “decently” soak up immigrants who had been generally “pressured to dwell on the road and fall into crime”.

Among the many protesters was Chega chief Andre Ventura, whose social gathering greater than quadrupled its seats at this yr’s election.

Tensions surfaced because the march approached working-class neighbourhoods with massive immigrant populations. Some protesters engaged in a standoff with pro-immigration activists in favour of a Portugal open to foreigners.

Posters studying “No Portugal with out immigrants” additionally lined partitions and bus stops alongside the route of the march.

The variety of foreigners dwelling in Portugal jumped by 33.6 % final yr to succeed in multiple million, about one-tenth of the entire inhabitants, in line with the Company for Integration, Migration and Asylum.

The centre-right authorities toughened migration coverage in June. It scrapped a measure permitting immigrants to use for regularisation if they may show they’d been working for at the very least one yr even when they’d entered the nation illegally.