The Portuguese take a step to the right

The small Iberian nation is witnessing the end of the cycle. The right achieved a major victory, while after nine years at the helm of the country, the left suffered one of its biggest electoral setbacks. On the evening of Sunday, March 10, at the end of the early legislative elections, while the results were not yet final and caution had to be exercised, Governor Luis Montenegro was tampering with the position of Prime Minister. At the head of the right-wing Democratic Alliance coalition, he received a third of the votes.

The other big winner of the evening was far-right populist Andre Ventura, who has recorded a stunning rise: his Chiga party, founded just five years ago, has risen in two years from 7% of the vote to nearly 20% today, which is Nearly three times as much. Andre Ventura, ally of other European far-right leaders (Marine Le Pen, Italian Salvini or Spaniard Abascal), overthrew the pacifist Portuguese chessboard, which until then had been characterized by the undivided dominance of the Socialist Party and the Social Democratic Party (PSD, conservative, coalition with the CDS and PPM within AD).

On Sunday evening, with the emergence of this third major parliamentary force, commentators unanimously agreed that Portugal, a historically peaceful and peaceable country, had entered a period of turmoil and political instability. Main Motive: Chiga's far right.

Costa's shadow loomed over P.S

The socialists, even if the number of their representatives remains large, are losing spectacularly to the rising right. In addition, the allies with whom they formed a government coalition in 2015 collapsed: the Left Bloc fell, as did the Communist Party, which lost many of its historic voters to Chega. Analysts will talk for a long time about November 7, 2023, the day Prime Minister António Costa resigned after being embroiled in a corruption and influence-peddling case linked to energy projects. This is despite the fact that he ruled in complete peace, as he obtained an absolute majority in 2022.

For the first time in 50 years, the far right can play the role of kingmaker in Portugal

After his resignation, things went from bad to worse for the Socialist Party. His successor, Pedro Nuno Santos, although he debated well against Luis of Montenegro and showed his economic knowledge, he could not forget the popular Costa, who has ruled since 2015. It seems that the Portuguese made the Portuguese pay dearly. Note this corruption issue: It was It served as the straw that broke the camel's back in a series of affairs, which gave part of the electorate a feeling that the political class was largely corrupt. The last two years in power for Antonio Costa did not help, with the resignation of eleven prime ministers and two ministers. Among them was the Socialist candidate Pedro Nuno Santos, then in charge of transport, who was disowned by Antonio Costa over his choice of a new Lisbon airport.

Disturbances

The shift to the right is undeniable, with participation increasing by about 52%, or six points more than in 2022.

Ironically, this puts Luis Montenegro in a difficult position. He had promised not to rule in alliance with the extreme right, calling on voters to do so “Helpful vote”. “No no”Repeat over and over over the weeks. Now, in all likelihood, given the results that put him far from an absolute majority, it is difficult to see how he can do so without an agreement with Andre Ventura.

In the Portuguese context, this situation constitutes a revolution in political culture: never before has any party victorious at the ballot box faced the dilemma of having to ally itself with an anti-regime populist movement. Andre Ventura, penchant for the most extreme positions (from castrating pedophiles to expelling Muslims, including demanding a referendum on abortion, decriminalizing it for years, or aggressive penal code reform) will have to put an end to his violent criticism of PSD Lewis Montenegro, who qualified during the campaign “useful idiot”, if he himself wants to be part of the next executive branch. The classical right will have to contend with a rising power, extreme and unpredictable, which is certainly not as anti-European as its allies on the continent, but which has not hesitated, like Trump or Bolsonaro – an unprecedented fact here – to question transparency. The legitimacy of these elections.