Data Montenegro wants to hide can still be seen

On Sunday, September 3, the Prime Minister's office justified the request to hide the property registry numbers with the aim of "guaranteeing the protection of sensitive personal data that allows identifying the addresses of Montenegro's own home and family." The public disclosure of this data "constitutes an increased risk to the security of the Prime Minister and his family" and would imply "the mobilization of public security resources that prove impractical and costly to the public purse," they argued.

When declaring real estate assets to the Transparency Entity, politicians are not required to report the address of each property. However, other information is mandatory, such as the property registration number and the parish of the address, which, in turn, allow access to the Land Registry Certificate for the properties in question. Unlike the land registry book, this certificate can be consulted by third parties—not only accessible to the owner and legal representatives—and contains all the main legal information about the properties.

The Land Registry Certificate records all previous and current owners of the property, as well as its entire history of charges and transactions . The Prime Minister's accumulated assets are now known—in fact, they were the subject of Observador's work during the legislative election campaign.

But everything could change from now on. If Luís Montenegro's wishes are fulfilled and all his future tax returns no longer include the company's tax identification number, it will become impossible to know, for example, to whom the prime minister sells or buys properties and for what price.

The existence of a transaction of this nature (buying and selling houses) must always be reported to the Transparency Authority—it would, in principle, result in a change in assets exceeding 50 times the monthly minimum wage. However, without access to the main account, information about the details of this potential transaction would be inaccessible to third parties—namely, the media.

However, other information will continue to be included in the Prime Minister's income tax returns, as is the case with the declarations that currently have the matrix number hidden. The income tax return must include a description of the property's type , purpose (residential, commercial, etc.), and area.

The parish and municipality of the address must also be specified, as well as the property's net value—used primarily to calculate IMI (Import Tax) and not equivalent to the market value, which is generally much higher. All declarations submitted by Luís Montenegro must continue to include this information.

Luís Montenegro's office stated on Sunday, September 3, that the opposition to the release of the matrix for security reasons did not concern 55 properties, but referred "only to 6 urban properties that constitute his habitual residence and the residence addresses of his closest family."

But in fact, even the six urban properties whose registered office Luís Montenegro now wants to hide have been reported several times over the past few years. It is public knowledge that the prime minister owns a house in Espinho , a duplex apartment in Estrela , Lisbon, an apartment in Bragança , and a house in the municipality of Resende , which, because it has two garages that are considered independent units, corresponds to three urban buildings.

The location of these buildings can't even be said to be a secret. Espinho's house , which tormented the prime minister for several months due to a Public Prosecutor's Office investigation, has been the subject of numerous reports. During his first legislative campaign, Luís Montenegro himself recorded an interview there with Daniel Oliveira for the program Alta Definição. In 2022, the then-opposition leader hosted a CNN crew at the family farm where his mother lives, in Resende. Montenegro has also never hidden the fact that he chose Travessa do Possolo, the same place where Aníbal Cavaco Silva lives, as his Lisbon residence.

In response to Observador, the Constitutional Court confirms that Luís Montenegro's requests to the Transparency Entity "request opposition only to the urban property matrices" and adds that the first formal contacts in this regard, which require the justification of a "justifiable reason" for concealing the information, date back to November 2024. They also clarify that, "for reasons of computer security , the Platform operates by fields and not by records."

In other words, although Montenegro only requested the concealment of some properties (registrations), the request covers the entire field of real estate assets, resulting in the concealment of 49 rural properties as well. Excluding one rural property in the municipality of Resende, with a property value of €1,985, the average value of these properties is €5.47 .

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