The Regional Secretary for Education and Culture stated in Horta that "there are many reasons" to evoke in the Azores the establishment of the Republic. The government official highlighted the "significance of the act" that corresponds to the “annihilation of a monarchical regime of almost eight centuries and the establishment of republican regime," one of the first in Europe, following France and Switzerland.
 
Avelino Meneses spoke Wednesday on behalf of the President of the Government at the conference titled as "Memoirs of the first President of the Republic." In this context, he stressed that celebrating the Republic on the islands "is also to honour the memory of distinguished Azorean personalities," namely Teófilo Braga, Manuel de Arriaga, Eduardo Abreu and Goulart de Medeiros, and to "evoke our history."
 
However, the Regional Secretary stressed that, after more than 100 years, "the Republic is still truly unfulfilled," particularly in respect to the approach of Portugal to the "more developed" Europe in the urgent need "strengthen and bring prosperity to civil society" and the "permanent reinvention of the governance style."
 
In this context, he defended that, at least, "the Republic needs to be refounded."
 
Avelino Meneses alluded to Manuel de Arriaga, who was born in Faial and was at the origin of this conference promoted by the Legislative Assembly and the Associations of Former Students of Horta Secondary School with the sponsorship of the Presidency of the Republic. The government official admitted that, if its "moderating role and conciliatory effect" had prevailed, perhaps the identification between the First Republic and the Portuguese nation would have endured."
 
"Maybe, it would have spared Portugal and the Portuguese people from a long dictatorship of almost half a century, which postponed democracy and delayed development," stressed the Regional Secretary.