“Thief. Crook. One day you’re dead. Hungry. Pig” Mayor of Mação Vasco Estrela returned to his car from an official event in his central Portuguese borough to find this less than pleasant message tucked underneath the wipers of the vehicle’s windscreen.
And in order to enlist the help of his local community in a bid to identify the writer, he has published it on his Facebook page, along with photographs of the complaint for ‘offences and a death threat” now lodged with GNR police.
Says the mayor, in spite of it being “extraordinarily difficult” he hopes judicial authorities will be able to discover “the author of such a courageous form of expression”.
Needless to say, mayor Estrela stresses that he will continue to conduct himself in the way he always has “independent of offences and threats that may be made to me”, lamenting only the upset this situation could cause his family, particularly his children.
Vasco Estrela has been mayor of Mação for over six years now, having previously been deputy mayor for almost five years.
He told his local paper O Mirante: “We live in a democratic country. People do not have to like me or my decisions but rules of coexistence have to exist – and death threats make no sense at all…”
As the ‘hunt is on’ to identify the writer, commentators are alluding to the handwriting which is reminiscent of the style traditionally taught in primary schools, suggesting the scribe is “a lamentable coward”.
None of the hundreds of ‘followers’ who have extended their support and horror over the outrage seem to have any ideas what could be behind it.
Mação is one of the interior boroughs that was so ravaged during the deadly wildfires of 2017. Indeed, following the fires, Vasco Estrela (PSD) had some very stern criticism for the performance of Civil Protection (click here), and since then, even this year, he’s exchanged tough commentary with interior minister Eduardo Cabrita, who accused him of “behaving like a television commentator”.
