State of the Nation: Prime Minister of Cape Verde says that the State of the Nation is trustworthy

"The State of the Nation is one of trust and positivism", said the head of government, at the start of the traditional debate that marks the end of the parliamentary year in Cape Verde, where he began by underlining that the country is still experiencing the effects of droughts and crises pandemic and war in Ukraine, but reaffirmed several measures that have contributed to reducing poverty.

“Are there still people going through difficulties? Yes, they exist. It is so that there are fewer people and less families in poverty, that we are working and will continue to work", traced Correia e Silva, noting "progress" in the reduction of poverty, whose goal is to eliminate extreme poverty and reduce absolute poverty to 20%.

“Are there still difficulties? Yes. Haven't we reached 100% yet? We are going to achieve it”, the head of government also promised, noting that the economy has “recovered well” from the effects of the crises.

“The economic contraction was 20.8% in 2020, according to the final national accounts. The recovery was 7% in 2021 and 17.7% in 2022. In two years, we more than recovered from the brutal drop recorded in 2020”, he showed, saying that this recovery has had an impact on employment.

Remembering that tourism was the sector hardest hit by the crisis caused by the covid-19 pandemic, he underlined that it was also the one that most quickly recovered to levels higher than the period before the pandemic.

“836 thousand tourists in 2022. The goal is to reach 1.2 million tourists by 2026. We will continue to invest in the qualification of tourist destinations Sal and Boavista and in the affirmation of the other islands as tourist destinations according to their specificities”, he added.

In transport, he said that the country's airline, TACV, is recovering and relaunching activity, that the airport management concession to Vinci has already started and that the inter-island maritime transport concession has increased regularity, predictability and frequencies of maritime connections.

Correia e Silva also described several investments in roads all over the country, or in sectors such as water, agriculture, livestock, fisheries, blue economy, human resources and mobilization of external financing for other infrastructures.

As for youth unemployment, he acknowledged that it is still high, but noted progress and said that the Government is working to lower unemployment levels.

The Prime Minister said that public security continues to deserve “proper priority”, pointing to several ongoing measures, including special operations in Praia and Mindelo, to say that the Government will continue to invest in prevention, persuasion and in the lawsuit.

“And for those who are systematically stressed, our word is that we have a Government program to run until 2026, we were not elected to govern for just two years. We have a development strategy, we have an agenda for 2030, be patient”, he shot, in a 30-minute speech, with many criticisms of the performance of the largest opposition party.

“We are governing, we are producing results, we are going to produce more results, we are going to transform Cape Verde, this is our ambition, this is our objective, this is our mission”, he concluded.