as ready

I am really concerned with the consequences of the Irish rejection of the Lisbon Treaty. The reason for my concern is that I feel we are living through a most dramatic economic situation. If you have not felt its effects so far you will feel them soon. The last thing we would need now was an institutional crisis in the EU.

I am now writing from a strictly Portuguese point of view. European funds are likely to be delayed as a consequence of the Irish vote. We are going to need them desperately to compensate for the expected, drastic fall in GDP. We are going to need them to pay, in part, for our runaway current account deficit. We are going to need them to assist the poor in these most difficult economic conditions.

The severe recession that is hitting all of Europe and North America will affect all countries for sure, but we are specially vulnerable. There is a tendency for countries under economic stress to take care of their own interests and forget their common goals and the Irish vote might be part of this tendency. Thus the European Union, even without the Irish referendum, was set to live through a period of severe institutional stress. The Irish vote just gave it a devastating blow.

There is no question for me that Portuguese democracy would have not survived without the European Union. Institutional stability is the great benefit that the EU brought to us, much more than roads, bridges and cohesion funds. It is quite significant that prime minister José Socrates declared yesterday that he felt the Portuguese state was at peril just because of the truck-drivers' strike. I think that he exaggerated a bit.

The truth is that the Portuguese democratic state is not at peril as long as the EU lives and is held strong. It is as ready to explode, though, as soon as the EU shows signs of disintegration. This is my real fear with regard to the Irish No vote.