Local power will change this Sunday in Portugal, but far from the turnaround that was experienced in the May legislative elections, when the far-right became the second political force. The polls conducted by television point to local governments in the hands of the two parties that have had political hegemony in democracy, the Social Democratic Party (PSD, center-right) and the Socialist Party (PS). Chega, the ultra-led formation would advance significantly, although it would remain as the third or fourth force in the main municipal chambers.
The two most notable duels reached election day with technical ties and this continued in all the polls broadcast on television. Both Lisbon and Porto showed similar percentages for the right-wing and left-wing coalitions competing for mayoralty, although with slight advantages for the conservative lists.
In the Portuguese capital, the RTP poll carried out by the Catholic University gave the same results for Carlos Moedas, the mayor who is running for re-election at the head of a right-wing coalition, as for the former socialist minister Alexandra Leitão, who headed a left-wing coalition. Both would range between 37% and 42%. The third position would be for the communist candidate João Ferreira, ahead of Chega. In other polls this tie is maintained, although with a slight advantage for Moedas.
After the departure of the , the struggle between the right and the left is also one of the unknowns of the day. Two former ministers, Pedro Duarte (PSD) and Manuel Pizarro (PS), were competing for the chamber of the country’s second city and, according to the polls, both are very evenly matched. The public broadcaster’s poll gave between 36% and 40% for Duarte, compared to a range between 33% and 37% for Pizarro.
The projections show a greater resilience of the PS than that shown in the last legislative elections among the 308 municipalities, although it will be difficult for it to continue leading half of the town councils. In 2021, the socialists (and their coalitions) won 149 mayoralties, compared to 113 for the Social Democratic Party (PSD, center-right) and its allies. It was, however, since Portuguese law determines that the candidate from the list with the most votes will be elected mayor, even if he does not have an absolute majority in the plenary session. This allowed it to become the surprise of the night by prevailing over the socialists, who had governed the capital uninterruptedly since 2007.
Moedas has entered these elections tied in the polls with the socialist candidate, Alexandra Leitão, a former minister in the Government of António Costa, who managed to bring together a left-wing coalition from which only the Communist Party stood out, which presented its own list. Leitão has not used the management of the , against the mayor in the campaign, but previous polls showed that Moedas’s evaluation worsened as a result of the event.
The municipal elections held this Sunday in Portugal were more than just an event in which 9.3 million Portuguese could elect mayors. For the main political leaders, it was a matter of checking whether the cycle opened in the last legislative elections in May, when there was a resounding turn to the right that included the consecration of the extremist Chega as the main opposition force, was established or if it had been a temporary episode.
Although it was taken for granted that the far-right would grow in municipal representation, taking into account that in the 2021 local elections the party was barely two years old, the unknown was knowing how much. Four years ago, it achieved only around twenty municipal representatives throughout the country, including its leader, André Ventura, who had run for the local assembly of Moura, a town in the Alentejo. But in four years the Portuguese political map is unrecognizable.
Ventura, who has become leader of the opposition, aspires to the presidency of the Republic in the January elections. His party received more than 1.4 million votes in the May legislative elections, thus breaking the traditional two-party system that has distinguished Portuguese politics in democracy. The polls, however, seem to show that bipartisanship in city councils is in better health than in Parliament.
