Ana Maria Rosa Martins Gomes (born 9 February 1954), better known as Ana Gomes, is a Portuguese former diplomat and politician of the Socialist Party (PS).

She earned wide recognition for her role in negotiating independence for East Timor, a former Portuguese colony, and in the reestablishment of diplomatic relations between Portugal and Indonesia. She later suspended her career as a diplomat to enter party politics, and served as a Member of the European Parliament from 2004 until 2019, where she was an outspoken campaigner on corruption and human rights.

On 10 September 2020, she officially announced her candidacy for the 2021 Portuguese presidential election, without official support from the Socialist Party. She finished second, with 13% of the votes, the best result ever achieved by a woman in a presidential election in Portugal.

Education and early political career

Ana Gomes was born in 1954 in Alfredo da Costa Maternity Hospital, in the Lisbon parish of São Sebastião da Pedreira, and she grew up during the authoritarian Estado Novo regime.

Her father, Jorge Pedro Martins Gomes, was an officer of the merchant marine and her mother, Maria Alice Rosa Gomes, In her teenage years, she accompanied her father to the rallies of the opposition movements Democratic Unity Electoral Commission (CEUD, Comissão Eleitoral de Unidade Democrática) and the Portuguese Democratic Movement/Democratic Electoral Commissions (MDP/CDE, Movimento Democrático Português/Comissões Democráticas Eleitorais) that unsuccessfully ran in the fraudulent 1969 legislative election, amid extensive harassment of opposition candidates and voter manipulation. Her parents allowed her and her sister a liberal education, initially at Colégio da Baforeira, a boarding school in Parede, and then the lyceum in São João do Estoril, As an initiation, she was recruited to paint large murals against the Colonial War. According to ambassador Fernando de Oliveira Neves, as relayed in his work O Negociador (2019), Gomes showed "unusual professionalism" and had an "extraordinary role" in the negotiations, and became a friend of Ali Alatas who came to admire her. She authored a 2008 report on China's role in Africa, which criticised Chinese imports of natural resources from the continent. In 2018, she chaired a delegation of the European Parliament to investigate the rule of law and money laundering in Malta.

In addition to her committee assignments, Gomes was part of the parliament's delegations to the ACP–EU Joint Parliamentary Assembly (2004–2009) and for relations with Iraq as well as of the Intergroup on Western Sahara and the Group of Friends European Parliament/East Timor. She also participated in a number of European Parliament missions to Afghanistan, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Chad, China, Democratic Republic of Congo, East Timor, Kosovo, Lebanon, Indonesia (including Aceh), Iraq, Israel, Palestine, Sudan (Darfur), Turkey, USA, etc. She took part in the following Election Observation Missions (EOM):

:*Ethiopia (2005) - Head of the EU's EOM

:*Democratic Republic of Congo (2006) - Member of the European Parliament's EOM

:*East Timor (2007) - Head of the European Parliament's EOM

:*Angola (2008) - Member of the European Parliament's EOM

Political positions and controversy

During her time in the European Parliament, Gomes' main areas of activity were: migration, human rights, security and defence, international relations, gender issues and development. In 2010 she signed the Spinelli Group manifesto supporting a federal Europe.

In 2012, Gomes argued she was held at Bahrain International Airport for over seven hours despite holding a diplomatic passport when she tried to enter Bahrain during a stopover on the way to Benghazi, Libya.

Gomes faced accusations of antisemitism for inviting anti-Israel speakers to the European Parliament and allegedly referring to Jewish organizations as a "perverse lobby".

Her activism and membership in the migration focused NGO Friends of Europe were commented upon in an interview by the Romanian prime-minister Viorica Dancila as "totally uninspired". Two requests made by the Deputy Attorney General of Portugal in 2014 and 2017 to waive Ana Gomes' parliamentary immunity with respect to criminal proceedings against her in connection with statements made by her in a television debate and in an interview with the Portuguese Journal "Diário de Noticias" whereas the newspaper article indicated that investigations were under way in relation to the Viana shipyards and in this connection Gomes commented that "something was starting to happen with regard to a case of blatant corruption" have both been decided against by the European Parliament.

Defamation law suits

Mário Ferreira vs. Ana Gomes 2019

In April 2019 Gomes referred on Twitter to the CEO of Douro Azul, Mário Ferreira, as a "crook" in connection with the shipyard case in Viana do Castelo. This case involved allegations of irregularities and corruption in the shipyard industry, which attracted significant media attention and public scrutiny.

Gomes derogatory remarks about Ferreira led to a legal dispute. A court in Porto ultimately ruled in favor of the CEO and found Gomes guilty of defamation and insulting behavior. As a result, she was ordered to pay an indemnity of EUR 10,000 in damages to the CEO as compensation for the harm caused by her statements.

Mário Ferreira vs. Ana Gomes 2024

In January 2024, Gomes faced trial at the Bolhão Court in Porto, in a case involving allegations of aggravated defamation against entrepreneur Mário Ferreira.

This marked the fourth legal proceeding initiated by Mário Ferreira against Ana Gomes. The charges stem, once again, from statements made by Gomes X (formerly Twitter) in March 2021, following a report by Expresso detailing Mário Ferreira's investments, including private aviation. This occurred just one month after an OMNI aircraft, purportedly returning to Portugal, was intercepted in Brazil with over 500 kilograms of drugs on board.

In one of her online posts, Ana Gomes wrote: <blockquote>How interesting! Thanks to Expresso, we discover that the multifaceted shipowner Mário Ferreira is now investing not only in Media Capital/TVI but also in another struggling profit business: private aviation... Will he be flying to Brazil, following the OMNI's footsteps?</blockquote>During the trial, Gomes emphasized that her intention had been solely to highlight the lack of control at national aerodromes, where various irregularities are known to occur, while at the same accusing Mário Ferreira of being a straw man for foreign investors engaged in money laundering.

Gomes ended up being accquited from her charges she was facing from Mário Ferreira.

Personal life

Ana Gomes civilly married a colleague of the Faculty of Law of the University of Lisbon, António Monteiro Cardoso (whom she called "Toné") on 20 May 1974, shortly after the Carnation Revolution, in a register office in Alcântara, Lisbon. The couple then had lunch in a nearby restaurant, Galão, with their parents, the groom's sister, and the best man, António Luís Cotrim. According to Gomes, the whole affair was brief and there was not even a picture taken of the event ("we did not care for such bourgeois vices"

She currently lives in Cascais.

|}

Presidential election, 2021

|-

! colspan="2" |Candidate

! Votes

! align="center" style="width: 50px"|%

|-

| style="background:;"|

| align=left |Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa || 2,531,692 || 60.7

|-

| style="background:;"|

| align=left |Ana Gomes || 540,823 || 13.0

|-

| style="background:#202056;"|

| align=left |André Ventura || 497,746 || 11.9

|-

| style="background:;"|

| align=left |João Ferreira || 179,764 || 4.3

|-

| style="background:;"|

| align=left |Marisa Matias || 165,127 || 4.0

|-

| style="background:;"|

| align=left |Tiago Mayan Gonçalves || 134,991 || 3.2

|-

| style="background:#00939d;"|

| align=left |Vitorino Silva || 123,031 || 3.0

|-

| colspan="2" align="left"| Blank/Invalid ballots

| 85,182 || –

|- style="background-color:#E9E9E9"

| colspan="2" align="left"| Turnout

| 4,258,356 || 39.26

|-

| colspan="4" align=left|Source: Comissão Nacional de Eleições

|}

Publications

Numerous articles published in the Courrier Internacional, Diário de Notícias, Expresso, Jornal de Leiria, Jornal de Notícias, Público and Visão.

Book Todo-o-Terreno - 4 Anos de Reflexões (RCP Edições, November 2008, Lisbon)

Other activities

  • Member of the Student Union, Classical University of Lisbon, Lisbon (1974–1976)
  • Member of the Board of the Union of Portuguese Diplomats (1982–1986 and 1994–1996)
  • Deputy-Chair of Parliamentarians for Nuclear Nonproliferation and Disarmament, European Parliament Section
  • Member of the Portuguese chapter of Amnesty International
  • Member of International Development NGOs CIDAC and Engenho & Obra
  • Member of the Portuguese Association of Women Jurists

Recognition

National orders

  • 80px Grand Cross of the Military Order of Christ (9 June 2000)
  • 80px Grand Officer of the Order of Prince Henry (18 March 1986)

Awards

  • Ruth Pearce Award for Human Rights by Human Rights NGOs, Geneva, 1989
  • Personality of the Year Award - 1999, Expresso weekly newspaper, Lisbon, 1999
  • Personality of the Year Award - 1999, Association of International Correspondents, Lisbon, 1999
  • Human Rights Award of the Assembly of the Republic (Portuguese parliament), 1999
  • Activist of the Year - 2008, The Parliament Magazine, Brussels, 2008

References

<!-- Per WP:ELMINOFFICIAL, choose one official website only -->

  • [https://anagomes2021.pt/]