Lisbon, April 22, 2025 (Lusa) - Portugal's opposition Socialist Party (PS) in the Lisbon city council, where they also form the largest opposition group, on Monday backed a proposal from the centre-right mayor to rename a park after the late Pope Francis, but warned against abandoning the space, while the council of neighbouring Loures said it will formalise the name next week.
Following the death of Pope Francis on Monday at the age of 88, the mayor of Lisbon, Carlos Moedas of the centre-right Social Democratic Party (PSD), speaking on the sidelines of a Roman Catholic mass in honour of the late pontiff, who died early on Monday, said that he would propose that the council change the name of the Parque Tejo to Parque Papa Francisco.
Lusa questioned the office of Moedas, who lacks a majority in the city executive, about when the proposal will be discussed at a meeting of the municipal executive, in particular a public session planned for Wednesday, but he responded that it had not yet been scheduled.
Parque Tejo, which stretches into the municipalities of both Lisbon and Loures, with around 100 hectares in total, was created after the transformation of a rubbish dump, the Beirolas landfill, into a green park.
It was one of the main sites for the World Youth Day (WYD) organised by the Church in August 2023, which was attended by Pope Francis and drew around 1.5 million people.
Reacting to the mayor's proposal, the PS members of the exective said that they “couldn't help but agree with a fair tribute to the Pope who visited Portugal twice, who hosted WYD in Lisbon” - while stressing that they would prefer that significant intervention was made in the area, “so as not to baptise an open field with his name.”
In a statement sent to the Lusa news agency, city executive member Rui Tavares, of the Livre party, said that "the mayor of Lisbon is treating a serious matter with disregard" - pointing out that the municipal rules of naming or renaming streets in the city afer somemone state that in order to do so "you have to wait five years after the person's death.
"Livre and all the other parties have heard this enough throughout this mandate," Tavares continued. "Of course the rules include exceptions, but we have to think about them together, and it's disrespectful to Pope Francis himself that the mayor of Lisbon didn't start this discussion with all the councillors."
The municipal regulation states that "the attribution of a place name should only take place five years after the death of the personality, and this guideline may, on a very exceptional and duly substantiated basis, not be respected."
The members of the executive from Citizens For Lisbon (elected on the joint PS/Livre coalition ticket) said that their concern, "beyond the name, goes to the use and state of the space" of Parque Tejo, emphasising that the proposal to rename the park Parque Papa Francisco has not yet been distributed.
Also noting that it had no formal knowledge of the terms of the proposal, the Communist Party (PCP) said it was not opposed to Pope Francis's name being given to Parque Tejo, but argued that "it's important to turn the green park into a real green park.
"This is a large space with no tree cover," the party stressed, arguing that it is necessary to add “not only trees, but equipment, leisure areas and toilets."
Lusa also questioned the Left Bloc (BE) executive members, who said they would take a stance when they had access to the proposal.
Since each city council has autonomy to decide on its territory, Loures council, which is led by Ricardo Leão of the PS, plans to go ahead and rename the greensward Parque Papa Francisco at an ordinary executive meeting on 30 April.
"Loures City Council has always shown, in all its references to the park, that this would be the name," a source from Leão's office told Lusa. "Even before WYD took place, it referred to the park as Parque Papa Francisco."
The same source said that proof of this are the two billboards in the area advertising the “Future Parque Papa Francisco”.
The new park in Loures was due to be inaugurated in February this year, but this did not happen because work is still going on, said the same source, without saying when it was expected to be completed.
As for Lisbon, which hosted the 10th edition of Rock in Rio in June 2024 on its part of the site, its council said in August that the park had been completed but would undergo "various improvements" to improve the enjoyment and comfort of the population.
Connecting the two municipalities in Parque Tejo is a bridge for cyclists and pedestrians over the River Trancão, which was also built as part of the WYD.
In the wake of WYD, the mayor of Lisbon announced, without a prior vote by the municipal executive, that the bridge would be called Ponte Cardeal Dom Manuel Clemente, after the cardinal-patriarch of Lisbon. But this sparked controversy at a time when accusations relating to the failure of the hierarchy in Portugal to tackle sexual abuse within the Church.
A petition to "change the planned name" gathered more than 17,000 signatures, and the cardinal-patriarch himself ended up turning down the honour, saying that he did not want "the attribution to be a cause of division, or for anyone to feel offended."
After that, there were several proposals to name the bridge, including Lisbon's Animal Welfare Ombudsman suggesting Ponte Noé (Noah Bridge) and the People-Animals-Nature (PAN) group in the municipal assembly proposing the name São Francisco de Assis, and the idea of a public consultation process involving both the Lisbon and Loures municipalities in order to choose the name. But after more than a year, the bridge has still not been given an official name.
Also in August 2023, a petition was created to call on the mayors of Lisbon and Loures "to officially name the Tejo-Trancão Parque Urbano the Parque Papa Francisco, thus commemorating this unique event for both cities."
Born in Buenos Aires, Pope Francis died on Monday aged 88 of a stroke after 12 years as pontiff, having made his last public appearance, in St Peter's Square, on Easter Sunday, the day before he died.
Portugal has decreed three days of national mourning, from Thursday to Saturday.
SSM/ARO // ARO.
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