The past year had lots of bad news, which had us saying lots of bad words, new and old: Ebola, jihadism, selfie. But as a reminder that local and national events often still hold sway, the Word of 2014 in Portugal was corrupção.
Corruption was indeed on the lips and minds of Portuguese, as the country’s political class was rocked by several scandals this past year, the most notable being the arrest in late November of former Prime Minister José Sócrates over suspicions of tax fraud, money laundering and corruption.
News agency Lusa reports that Portugal’s largest publishing house Porto Editora published the results of its annual survey for the “Word of the Year” and “corruption” arrived first among 10 pre-selected words, gathering 25% of the votes. “Selfie” could do no better than third place.