General election in Portugal 1979
The parliamentary elections in Portugal in 1979 took place on December 2nd. It ended a stalemate that had arisen due to the parliamentary majority after the 1976 parliamentary election .
background
After the 1976 election, on the one hand, the rivalries between socialists and communists prevented the formation of a mathematically possible left government; The attempt to establish a viable left-right government (PS and CDS) under M. Soares failed after a short time due to irreconcilable contradictions.
President António Ramalho Eanes then tried to stabilize the political situation by mandating the formation of non-partisan governments under Alfredo Nobre da Costa (August to November 1978) and under Carlos Mota Pinto (November 1978 to June 1979). In the absence of parliamentary majorities, however, none of these governments lasted long. On July 13, 1979, President Eanes dissolved parliament, called early elections for December 1979 and instructed the representative of Portugal to UNESCO, Maria de Lourdes Pintasilgo , to form a transitional government, which began work in August 1979.
On the bourgeois side of the party spectrum, the leader of the Social Democratic Party (PSD), formerly the People's Democratic Party (PPD), Francisco Sá Carneiro , had become the undisputed leader of the opposition. He united the two most important bourgeois parties, his conservative-liberal social democrats and the right-wing conservative Social and Democratic Center (CDS) under the name Democratic Alliance (AD) to form a list connection. The small monarchist PPM party also participated as a third party in this center-right alliance .
A coalition was also formed on the left in 1978. The Communists (PCP) and the Portuguese Democratic Movement - Democratic Election Commission (MPD / CDE), which emerged as an opposition force as early as 1969 under the Estado Novo , formed the APU, the Alliance of United People .
Election results
Sá Carneiro won the election with his Democratic Alliance by a clear margin and, as Prime Minister, from January 1980 also led the first bourgeois government since the revolution of 1974 .
The turnout was 82.87%. The count was carried out according to the D'Hondt method.
| Political party | be right | Seats | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| number | % | +/- | number | +/- | ||
| Aliança Democrática | 2,554,458 | 42.5 | +1.7 | 121 | +6 | |
| Partido Socialista | 1,642,136 | 27.3 | −7.6 | 74 | −33 | |
| Aliança Povo Unido | 1,129,322 | 18.8 | +4.4 | 47 | +7 | |
| Partido Social Democrata | 141.227 | 2.4 | - | 7th | - | |
| União Democrática Popular | 130,842 | 2.2 | +0.5 | 1 | - | |
| Partido da Democracia Cristã | 72,514 | 1.2 | +0.7 | - | - | |
| Partido Comunista dos Trabalhadores Portugueses | 53,268 | 0.9 | +0.2 | - | - | |
| União da Esquerda para a Democracia Socialista | 43,325 | 0.7 | - | - | - | |
| Partido Socialista Revolucionário | 36,978 | 0.6 | +0.5 | - | - | |
| Centro Democrático e Social | 23,523 | 0.4 | - | - | - | |
| Partido Operário de Unidade Socialista | 12,713 | 0.2 | - | - | - | |
| Organização Comunista Marxista-Leninista Portuguesa | 3,433 | 0.1 | - | - | - | |
| Blank ballot paper | 42,863 | 0.7 | - | |||
| Invalid ballot | 120,851 | 2.0 | −2.7 | |||
| total | 6.007.453 | 100.0 | 250 | −13 | ||
| Eligible voters | 7,249,346 | |||||
| voter turnout | 82.9% | |||||
| Source: | ||||||
consequences
According to the Portuguese constitution at the time, these early elections did not start a new parliamentary term, but rather the newly elected parliament only ended the election period that began in 1976. That is why on October 5, 1980, regular elections took place again this time .
See also
Individual evidence
- ↑ Deputados e Grupos Parlamentares ( Memento of the original of July 16, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ a b Resultados Eleitorais , on eleicoes.cne.pt, accessed on January 30, 2012
Web links
- Comissão Nacional de Eleições Official website of the Electoral Commission
- Politics and government Wir-in-Portugal.de
