Prime Minister convinced there will be a surplus this year despite the “new priority” for Defense

The Prime Minister today expressed his conviction that there will be a budget surplus this year despite the “new priority” given to Defense, guaranteeing that he will not transfer “a single cent” from any area of ​​public policy.

In an interview with RTP, recorded in Brussels, on the same day that the NATO Summit ended in The Hague, Luís Montenegro admitted that the area of ​​Defense “is a new priority” for his Government, but “that it does not jeopardize the others”.

“Our expectation – no one is absolutely certain, the year is not over yet – but everything indicates, we are fully confident, that we will reach the end of the year with balanced public accounts and, therefore, with a new budget surplus,” he said.

When asked whether the commitment to achieve the 2% of GDP target for Defense this year implies transferring funds from another area, such as health, he replied: “Absolutely zero. We will not change a cent in any of our public policy areas.”

Asked to explain how he will achieve this investment – ​​which he estimated in The Hague would cost around one billion euros – Luís Montenegro assured that it is not a case of “creative accounting”.

“We have not discovered any gold mine to pay for these expenses now,” he said, adding that the Government will allocate to Defense “resources that it has available from the reserves in the Ministry of Finance and from the capacity that the budget execution itself allows.”

For the future, he admitted that the Government will have to “have a multi-annual plan to continue to increase this investment in the coming years”, in order to get closer to the 5% target set today for 2035.

As he had done at the end of the NATO Summit, the Prime Minister explained that this investment involves the valorisation that is already being made in the human resources of the Armed Forces but also in equipment, giving as examples the need “to modernise the Pandur vehicles”, “look at the ocean patrol vessels” or take advantage of the advantages that the country already has “in the capacity to build aircraft, such as the KC-390”.

“We can do this, including by looking at the capabilities of our industry and the maintenance capabilities we have in Portugal. This has another effect, which is to boost our economy,” he said.

Asked whether the commitments made in The Hague were due to pressure from the United States or a real need, Montenegro admitted that it was “a combination of both factors” and avoided commenting on threats from US President Donald Trump that he could penalize Spain with additional tariffs for its refusal to further increase investment in Defense.

“What we have to verify is whether this decision is the best decision for our countries, for our Europe, for the interests of our citizens. Today, our democracies are under serious threat,” he stressed.