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Parque das Nações Marina to be Transferred to Portuguese State

20 August 2018

Upon the dissolution and liquidation of Parque Expo’98, the holding company’s assets will be transferred to the Portuguese state. The Lisbon City Council will take possession of 11 buildings.

Upon the extinction of Parque Expo’98, the holding company’s assets will be transferred to the Portuguese state and divided between the central government and the municipality of Lisbon. According to the Diário de Notícias, the Lisbon City Council will thus take possession of 11 of the properties, while the central government takes over the remaining 37, in addition to the Marina and the Parque das Nações cable car.

The extinction of the holding company has been in the works since 2011, the year in which the then Minister of Agriculture, Sea, Environment and Spatial Planning approved the privatisation of the Pavilhão Atlântico and announced that the Lisbon Oceanarium would remain in the public domain as a “self-sustaining” entity. At the time, Assunção Cristas also considered privatising the Parque das Nações Marina, but never formalised the idea.

Seven years later, the holding company’s assets are being transferred to the State, and the process of dissolution and liquidation of the Parque Expo’98 is expected to be concluded shortly. Although the municipality, led by Fernando Medina, will take over 11 buildings if it decides to rent or sell these properties, half of the revenues will go to the central government’s coffers.

“This is the moment to take the opportunity to settle the company’s obligations with the Municipality of Lisbon, transferring the relevant properties so that urban planning management may be exercised within the attributions and competencies of the municipality,” reads the decree, published in Diário da República (Official Gazette), on Friday.

Also, all contractual and procedural legal relationships relating to Parque Expo’98 – except for the assets transferred to the Lisbon City Council – are now the responsibility of the General Directorate for Treasury and Finance.

Original Story: Economia Online / Sapo

Translation: Richard Turner