MAI Clears the Backlog — Luís Neves Signs 20 PSP and GNR Expulsion Orders in His First Two Months at Palácio Foz

Two months into the job, Interior Minister Luís Neves has cleared the backlog of pending expulsive disciplinary decisions against Portuguese security-force members — twenty of them, published individually in the Diário da República. The breakdown was disclosed on 24 April: eleven PSP agents and nine GNR soldiers, all removed under the expulsion penalty that strips pension rights and closes the door on any return to public security service.

Neves took office on 23 February 2026 in the second Montenegro cabinet, inheriting from the previous minister a stack of completed disciplinary files in which the Inspector-General of Internal Administration had already recommended expulsion — but where the binding ministerial dispatch had not yet been signed. Under Portuguese administrative law, the expulsive penalty for a sworn security-force member requires the Minister's personal signature; the Inspector-General can propose it, but only the titular da pasta can actually remove the agent from service.

The twenty files, and why they were stuck

The Ministry confirms that by 20 April every pending file in this category had been dispatched. The decisions are being pushed into the Diário individually rather than as a block, which is why the cumulative number emerged only now through parliamentary and media disclosure. None of the individual names have been released by the Ministry — PSP and GNR identify their agents in the official gazette but redact them from press briefings — and the specific misconduct in each file has not been itemised beyond the Minister's description of 'comportamentos desviantes' (deviant behaviours).

That phrase, in the Portuguese internal-security vernacular, is the category used for the conduct that historically consumes the expulsion track: violence against detainees, theft from the service, improper handling of evidence, corruption in the issue of documents, and the small but persistent stream of cases where an agent is caught cooperating with organised crime. It is not used for administrative lapses — those draw lesser sanctions (suspension, transfer, demotion).

What the Minister actually said

Neves used the words 'muito firme' and 'inflexível' — very firm, inflexible — to describe his disciplinary posture, and tied the decisions to his broader reform announcement from 21 April: 'Os polícias são para estar na rua e para cumprir a sua missão' (officers are there to be in the street and fulfil their mission). The expulsion track is the hard edge of a wider operational shift he is trying to signal: fewer officers doing desk work, faster processing of disciplinary files that have historically lingered for eighteen months or more, and a clearer public message that the Interior Ministry will not protect its own.

The backlog problem he inherited

The structural issue behind the twenty files is the one every recent Interior Minister has struggled with: Portuguese security-force discipline runs on paper, its investigations are conducted by IGAI (the Inspectorate-General of Internal Administration) under a statutory timeline that assumes ministerial responsiveness, and when the Minister of the day does not prioritise signing, files stack up at the gabinete. Neves's predecessor had reportedly been sitting on multiple expulsion recommendations when the government changed hands in late February. His first move — confirmed by the 20 April completion date — was to work through that stack before adding his own reform agenda on top.

The reform plan the expulsions sit inside

The disciplinary cleanup is the first of four announcements Neves has made on the PSP and GNR file. The others, from his 21 April briefing, are:

• Pre-retirements and recruitment — roughly 900 PSP officers enter pre-retirement in 2026; the Minister committed to more than 1,000 new recruits entering service by year-end, with 600 by 29 May and 800 by December.
• Municipal police autonomy — the end of the rule that forces Polícia Municipal forces in Lisbon and Porto to recruit exclusively from PSP ranks. Lisbon has requested 100 officers from this reform and Porto has requested 80.
• Back to the street — civilian staff to take over PSP administrative posts, moving sworn officers into operational roles.
• Physical estate — a programme to renovate degraded esquadras (police stations), which unions have flagged for years.

What watchers should track next

Three indicators. First, the publication cadence of the twenty individual decisions in the Diário da República — the last name to be gazetted will close the backlog chapter and reset the baseline. Second, whether IGAI receives additional staffing in the 2026 budget execution, which is the only way the Minister's 'shortest possible timeframe' instruction translates into shorter investigation cycles. Third, whether police unions (ASPP/PSP for PSP and APG/GNR for GNR) challenge any of the twenty decisions through the administrative courts — the record of recent years suggests a subset typically do, and the reversal rate on expulsion decisions sits in single digits but is not zero.

The twenty files are not the reform. They are the minister clearing his desk of the reform his predecessor did not finish signing. The harder work — the recruitment pipeline, the civilianisation of admin posts, the estate programme — will land on the 2027 budget before anyone sees whether the posture converts into operating change.