Ruling against Portugal must be swiftly applied

The veto rights of the Portuguese government regarding decisions made by former state-run Portugal Telecom (PT) contravene EU law, the European Court of Justice ruled on Thursday. Portugal had used its so-called golden share to prevent the sale of PT shares in Brazilian mobile telephone provider Vivo to Spain's Telefónica. The left-liberal daily El País fears that the implementation of the judgement will take too long: "Commission President Durão Barroso said that he guarantees the ruling will be applied. He would keep his promise by acting as quickly as the shareholders (Telefónica and PT have already begun negotiating) and ensuring that the transaction is completed at similar conditions to those agreed on June 30. But the illegal golden share will win the day if Telefónica is forced to forsake its plans to purchase Vivo because of cheating, prolonged negotiations and irrational political obstacles."

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