Alberto Bernardes Costa

Alberto Bernardes Costa (born August 16, 1947 in Évora de Alcobaça ) is a Portuguese lawyer and politician of the Socialist Party (PS). Since 2005 he has been the head of the Portuguese Ministry of Justice.

Life

Bernardes Costa completed his school education in Leiria and then studied law at the Law Faculty of the University of Lisbon ; He completed his studies with the usual Licenciatura . He completed his legal clerkship in Leiria and shortly afterwards began working there as a lawyer.

In 1969 he ran for the Democratic Opposition ( Oposição Democrática ) in the constituency of Leiria. The PIDE , the Portuguese secret police , however, thwarted his candidacy and arrested Costa shortly afterwards. Following his arrest and expulsion from all universities, France granted him political refugee status between 1973 and 1974 .

After the Carnation Revolution in 1974 and the beginning of the democratization of Portugal, Costa was able to work as a lawyer again. He also worked for the Portuguese Bar Association and other administrative areas with legal implications. He has also lectured at the University of Lisbon, the Technical University of Lisbon and the Lisbon Institute of Applied Psychology (ISPA) .

Alberto Bernardes Costa has been a member of the Portuguese Parliament ( Assembleia da República ) since 1991 . During his time as a Member of Parliament, he already acted as President of the European Committee, as Vice Chairman of the Socialist Party and as Portuguese representative in the North Atlantic Assembly . After the parliamentary elections in 1995 , the election winner and Prime Minister-designate António Guterres appointed Bernardes Costa as Minister of the Interior , which he held until 1997. He then moved briefly (1997–1998) to the board of directors of the state-run Petróleos de Portugal - Petrogal, SA . After that he was a member of the European Convention , which drafted a European constitution , and represented Portuguese interests. In 2004 he was responsible for the election program of the Socialist Party for the European elections.

After the parliamentary elections in 2005 , in which the socialists won an absolute majority, Prime Minister José Sócrates appointed him as the new Minister of Justice . In his tenure so far, Costa saw the restructuring of the judiciary ( Reforma do Mapa Judiciário ) in Portugal as his greatest goal; it includes, among other things, a concentration of tasks, the closure of some courts and the merging of judicial districts. Since he took office, however, several serious legal proceedings have been pending, including the “Golden Pipe” ( Apito dourado ) football corruption scandal and the abuse scandal at the Casa Pia orphanage in Portugal .

Alberto Bernardes Costa is married and has three children.

Web links

• image
• Biography on the website of the Portuguese government (Portuguese, English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ João Pedro Henriques and Ana Sá Lopes: Governo: Metade PS, metade independentes ( Memento of October 28, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) , [Government: Half PS, Half Independent], Público , March 5, 2005
2. ↑ Presentation of the government project Reforma do Mapa Judiciário (PDF; 66.2 kB) (Portuguese)