Legalization of cannabis in Portugal: A Parliament crystallized in 2001

The Portuguese Parliament debated today in plenary the legalization of the personal use of cannabis, proposed by two parties, Bloco de Esquerda and Iniciativa Liberal. In a heated debate, which lasted almost two hours, it only took a few minutes to realize that the speech of the parliamentary groups has changed little or nothing since the last time this topic was discussed, in 2018. In fact, it can even be said that the majority of the deputies crystallized his speech in 2001, referring to the exhaustion of the “example of the decriminalization” of drugs and how Portugal was “innovative” and “pioneer” in harm reduction policies, without realizing that 20 years have passed and, After all, everything remains the same. The bills have been sent to the Commissions and will be discussed in detail for at least 60 days.

The tone of the debate was, once again, patronizing, based on myths and misinformation. Cannabis continues to be the skeleton in the closet, responsible for the famous “psychoses”, which deputies do not get tired of invoking, having even referred to the term “psychopath”.

The discourse of the right-wing parties, along with that of the Portuguese Communist Party and even the Socialist Party, is nauseating, as it is based on ignorance, myths and clichés, based on a total absence of evidence and up-to-date information. in the light of science.

In a country where the SICAD reports – Service for Intervention in Addictive Behaviors and Addictions – reveal that every year the main cause of overdose death in young people under 24 is alcohol, and cannabis continues to be insisted on as the worst of all evils. In this logic of demonizing a plant with recognized medicinal potential worldwide, the speech of Portuguese deputies is, at times, almost unbearable to hear, such is the blindness and ignorance.

But the problem is not just that.

Moisés Ferreira, from the Left Bloc

The very bills that today proposed to legalize the adult use of cannabis end up assuming, in essence, a prohibitionist logic. The Left Block (BE), despite including the right to self-cultivate up to 5 plants, proposes, on the other hand, to ban the sale of edibles and drinks with cannabis, which reveals a profound lack of knowledge of the reality of users and own international markets. The Liberal Initiative (IL) proposal, on the other hand, includes edibles, alcoholic beverages and even the commercialization of “synthetic cannabis”. Both projects propose, however, that the cultivation, manufacture and trade of the plant for personal consumption for “non-medical purposes” must be communicated to Infarmed, the National Medicines Authority. Portugal is definitely the country of paradoxes. It is not medicinal, but you must communicate it to Infarmed!?

The mandatory registration of cannabis users is also something incomprehensible and that only reveals the State's attempt to interfere in the private sphere of adult and responsible citizens. The same applies to the proposed limit for self-cultivation, of a maximum of 5 or 6 plants per person. Although the speeches of Moisés Ferreira, from BE, and João Cotrim de Figueiredo, from IL, are a breath of fresh air in the midst of so much acephalous speech, it is not in anyone's mind that there is a national record for those who smoke tobacco or for who drinks alcohol in this country. Or, on the other hand, to impose a limit on the vines that each one plants in his backyard, on the bottles of wine he consumes at home, or on the number of cigarettes he can smoke a day.

If you're going to legalize, legalize yourself! But let this patronizing tone be abandoned that those who use cannabis don't know what they're doing, that they can't consume plants with high levels of THC or, even worse, that they can, from today to tomorrow, become schizophrenic. Don't have the condescension to tell an adult that you can smoke cannabis, but that you can't eat it in butter or a cake, let alone drink it in a tea or any other flavored product. It makes no sense to legalize it and then ban it, without any rationale.

João Cotrim Figueiredo, from the Liberal Initiative. Photo: DR

It is also not understandable how it is possible to continue to invoke the example of the decriminalization of 2001, as if we were the best in the world, when we know that people are arrested in Portugal every day for having two or three or half a dozen plants at home. These people, who obviously cultivate for their own consumption so as not to have to resort to criminal networks, continue to be arrested, accused of drug trafficking and made defendants before a court that requires them to provide a term of identity and residence, with weekly presentations ( sometimes daily!) at a police station, and paying hefty fines. How are all these costs to the State with police operations and court proceedings justified? It is recalled that, of the 9353 offenses for drug use and individuals indicted in 2019, 7711 were for possession of cannabis, 632 for cocaine, 332 for heroin, 89 for ecstasy and 33 for other drugs (data from the SICAD report, 2019, page 16). It should be noted that of the total number of individuals indicted, 90% had a “non-drug-addicted consumption profile”.

After all, what decriminalization was this? Perhaps it was for “English to see” or else to be quoted with mouth full in committees or parliamentary debates. I do not believe that the thousands of people arrested and indicted for possession of cannabis in Portugal can say that they feel, in fact, decriminalized. This is not the reality on the ground, on the contrary.

Yes, we were pioneers and innovators in 2001, when we started treating drug addicts as “sick”. But in 2021 we continue to criminalize and humiliate adults who choose to use cannabis, when we know that there are not, and never have been, overdoses associated only with this plant and even after the UN and WHO have recognized its therapeutic potential.

In Portugal, there is a lack of a serious debate on this topic, with people who really understand what they are talking about, and not parrots that for decades have repeated the same myths and prejudices associated with the early XNUMXth century ban. Once again, it becomes obvious that this serious debate cannot and will not take place in a musty Assembly of the Republic, which boasts of a false decriminalization to the point of exhaustion, but which has not evolved, and this is clear in the speech of almost all the deputies , which still stigmatize those who decide, in their own judgment and right, to use cannabis, for whatever purpose.

Another 20 years may pass, and the deputies of the Portuguese Parliament will continue to crystallize in 2001, invoking the incredible “international example in terms of drug policy”, proving only that appearances are deceiving and that from theory to practice goes a great distance.