Zacarias da Costa

Zacarias da Costa

Zacarias ( Zac ) Albano da Costa (born January 16, 1964 in Remexio / Portuguese Timor ) is a politician from East Timor . From 2008 he was party leader of the Partido Social Democrata PSD ( Social Democratic Party ). From 2007 to 2012 Costa was a member of the national parliament and foreign minister of the country .

Costa is married to Milena Pires and has a son with her.

Occupation time

Costa completed his secondary school in Dare until 1975 , when his family fled to Portugal , where Costa finished school in the Azores . In the second year of his theological studies he went to the philosophical faculty of the Universidade Católica Portuguesa in Braga , where he studied humanism. Between 1988 and 1991, Costa was the chairman of the Faculty's Associação académica .

From 1992 to 1993 he was President of the Regional Committee in Lisbon . Costa participated in the restoration of the União Democrática Timorense UDT , East Timor's oldest party. This was successfully concluded at an extraordinary party congress in Lisbon in December 1993. Costa was elected one of the deputy chairpersons (re-election 1997). At the UDT he was responsible for the party's international relations. An eminent member of the Comissão Coordenadora da Frente Diplomática CCFD ( Coordinating Commission of the Diplomatic Front ), he is one of the most widely traveled of the Timorese resistance abroad. He represented the interests of East Timor in various forums around the world, for example in the General Assembly of the United Nations , in the Committee on Decolonization and in committees and commissions for human rights in Geneva . Costa spoke at seminars on decolonization in the Caribbean in Trinidad and Tobago , Saint Lucia, and Antigua and Barbuda . He was also the first East Timorese to have quasi- diplomatic status at the ACP - EU conference.

As a representative of the Timorese resistance in the European Union , Costa worked for several years in Brussels from 1995 . He was also a member of the Conselho Nacional de Resistência Timorense CNRT , the umbrella organization of the Timorese resistance.

Political career

After the independence referendum in 1999, in which the East Timorese people opted for independence from Indonesia , Costa returned to East Timor. From May 2000 to June 2001 he was the first general secretary of the Partido Social Democrata PSD. Today he is still President of the National Council of the PSD. In 2002, Costa supported Xanana Gusmão as general manager of the election campaign team in his candidacy for president . Costa's wife Milena Pires was the campaign manager.

Costa is a member of various non-governmental organizations in East Timor, for example he was Vice-President of the East Timor Red Cross , President of the General Assembly of East Timor’s Sports Clubs , Director of the NGO Fini Foun , founder and council member of the Aikido Federation , secretary of the Lions Club of East Timor and member of the Lifau Board of Trustees Foundation .

In the following years, Costa was a professional advisor to the Asian Development Bank and in December 2006 became an advisor to the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) for the private sector. He also runs the largest East Timorese travel agency and agency, Timor Mega Tours .

In 2007, Zacarias da Costa became Foreign Minister in the government under Prime Minister Xanana Gusmão. On December 7th, 2008, Costa was elected party chairman at a party congress in a vote against the previous general secretary Fernando Dias Gusmão .

In early April 2010 there was a dispute between Costa and Prime Minister Gusmão. Three international conferences were held in Dili within a week . Costa had ordered the Timorese ambassadors not to come to Dili for the conferences, but Gusmão revised the order and called the ambassadors back. Costa is said to have informed Gusmão of his resignation via SMS. At the conferences, Costa was absent, in contrast to the rest of the country's cabinet . On April 13, however, the East Timorese Foreign Ministry published a statement in which Costa stressed his loyalty and that of the PSD to Prime Minister Gusmão. Costa would retain full responsibility for his area until the Prime Minister proposes that the President be dismissed, according to the Constitution .

In September 2010, Costa was charged with abuse of office and corruption by the public prosecutor and subsequently suspended from his post by Prime Minister Gusmão and the parliament. The background to this was the award of a highly paid diplomatic post to the wife of Deputy Prime Minister José Luís Guterres . On November 25, the country's Supreme Court dismissed all charges against Costa.

In the parliamentary elections in East Timor in 2012 , the PSD clearly failed because of the three percent hurdle. Costa resigned from parliament and government.

From 2012 to 2017 Costa was a member of the State Council . In 2018 he was appointed head of the Community of Portuguese Speaking Countries (CPLP) election observation mission in São Tomé and Príncipe . In 2017, Costa gave up his party chairmanship to João Mendes Gonçalves .

Others

In 2003 Costa became President of the General Assembly of the newly founded Sporting Clube de Timor . In 2012 he received the Ordem de Timor-Leste .

Web links

Commons : Zacarias da Costa  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} [OS NOMES DA RESISTÊNCIA] (Portuguese) Link no longer active
2. ^ Tempo Semanal Timor, April 3, 2010, Zacarias (Minister of Foreign Affairs) Threatens to Resign to the Prime Minister by SMS, Xanana asks him to do so quickly
3. ^ Tempo Semanal, April 9, 2010, Zacarias Abandons His Post.
4. ^ Ministério dos Negócios Estrangeiros, Gabinete do Ministro, Pree release, Díli, April 12, 2010
5. ↑ Tempo Semanal, September 23, 2010, Breaking News: Vice Prime Minister "Lugu" and Foreign Minister Zac da Costa - Indicted
6. ↑ ABC, October 1, 2010, E Timor ministers indicted over corruption claims
7. ^ Tempo Semanal, November 25, 2010, Dili District Court rejects accusation filed against minister for foreign affairs
8. ↑ SAPO: Começa reunião do Conselho de Estado em semana de mudança de Governo em Timor-Leste , February 9, 2015 , accessed on September 16, 2017.
9. ↑ SAPO: Antigo MNE de Timor-Leste é chefe da missão de observação da CPLP , October 1, 2018 , accessed on October 2, 2018.
10. ↑ SAPO: Conheça a História do Sporting Clube de Timor , June 26, 2013 , accessed on August 7, 2017.
11. ↑ Jornal da República: DECRETO PRESIDENTE 47/2012 , May 18, 2012 , accessed on September 23, 2019.