Portugal only works by knowing someone who knows someone else

Portuguese here. My story isn’t much different from the rest. I left to finish my education, and worked abroad until last year when I decided to return, bring my girlfriend and start a business here.
It has been a harrowing experience. Portugal suffers from a culture of favors and institutional corruption. Things don’t work, are slow, and money never ends up where it should. People who can afford it simply go private, and those who are lucky get favors, or what we call a “cunha”. It has been painful to return and see (both through my eyes and my foreign girlfriend) that you either know someone inside, or you won’t make it.

Someone gets sick? Talk to a doctor you know about seeing you in-between patients or after hours.
Need a document, visa or statement done? You’ll need to slug through contacts and networks until you find someone who knows someone who can push the file, or be lucky enough to live in a small town with friendly staff who can try to “arrange it” for you. Otherwise you wait, forever…
Want to start a business here? That’s great, we have a ton of programs, both European and national you can benefit from, and are supposed to encourage entrepreneurship, but to actually get into one you better know someone inside who can review your application, otherwise it will get lost, forgotten or replied to after a few years.

I myself have gone this way after failing to get a GP, failing to help my girlfriend get her visa, without which she can’t get a job here, failing to get replies from potential partners and grants for my business. The worst part is I know I’m feeding a terrible cycle, because for every check-up or exam I got, another patient was skipped. For every file I managed to get accepted, someone else’s got delayed. For every application I managed to get looked at, another went overlooked.

I am trying to build something that encourages companies to invest here, and potentially solve part of this problem, but it’s impossible when our political, institutional and administrative classes are so out of touch with reality. They’re more concerned with making unrealistic decisions that look good on paper or pocketing public money.

This website is a great idea, and with enough legitimate content and exposure, I hope it can actually make a difference.