Next Portuguese legislative election

Next Portuguese legislative election
Portugal
On or before 13 October 2019

230 seats to the Assembly of the Republic
116 seats needed for a majority
 
Leader Pedro Passos Coelho António Costa Catarina Martins
Party PSD PS BE
Leader since 26 March 2010 28 September 2014 30 November 2014
Leader's seat Lisboa Lisboa Porto
Last election 89 seats[lower-alpha 1] 86 seats, 32.3% 19 seats, 10.2%
Seats needed Increase27 Increase30 Increase97

 
Leader Assunção Cristas Jerónimo de Sousa André Silva
Party CDS–PP CDU PAN
Leader since 13 March 2016 27 November 2004 26 October 2014
Leader's seat Leiria Lisboa Lisboa
Last election 18 seats[lower-alpha 1] 17 seats, 8.3% 1 seats, 1.4%
Seats needed Increase98 Increase99 Increase115

Incumbent Prime Minister

António Costa
PS


The Next Portuguese legislative election will be held no later than October 2019. At stake will be all 230 seats to the Assembly of the Republic.

Background

Politics of Portugal

Main article: Politics of Portugal

The President of Portugal has the power to dissolve the Assembly of the Republic by his own will. Unlike other countries the President can refuse to dissolve the parliament at the request of the Prime Minister or the Assembly of the Republic and all the parties represented in Parliament. If the Prime Minister resigns, the President must nominate a new Prime Minister after listening to all the parties represented in Parliament and then the government programme must be subject to discussion by the Assembly of the Republic, whose members of parliament may present a motion to reject the upcoming government.

Date

According to the Portuguese Constitution, an election must be called between 14 September and 14 October of the year that the legislature ends. The election is called by the President of Portugal but is not called at the request of the Prime Minister; however, the President must listen to all of the parties represented in Parliament and the election day must be announced at least 60 days before the election.[1] If an election is called during an ongoing legislature (dissolution of parliament) it must be held at least in 55 days. Election day is the same in all multi-seats constituencies, and should fall on a Sunday or national holiday. The next legislative election must, therefore, take place no later than 13 October 2019.[2]

Electoral system

The Parliament of the Portuguese Republic consists of a single chamber, the Assembly of the Republic, composed of 230 members directly elected by universal adult suffrage for a maximum term of four years. Assembly members represent the entire country, rather than the constituencies in which they were elected. Governments do not require absolute majority support of the Assembly to hold office, as even if the number of opposers of government is larger than that of the supporters, the number of opposers still needs to be equal or greater than 116 (absolute majority) for both the Government's Programme to be rejected or for a motion of no confidence to be approved.[3]

Each one of Portugal's eighteen administrative districts, as well as each one of the country's two autonomous regions - the Azores and Madeira - is an electoral constituency. Portuguese voters residing outside the national territory are grouped into two electoral constituencies - Europe and the rest of the world - each one of which elects two Assembly members. The remaining 226 seats are allocated among the national territory constituencies in proportion to their number of registered electors.

Political parties and party coalitions may present lists of candidates. The lists are closed, so electors may not choose individual candidates in or alter the order of such lists. Electors cast a ballot for a single list. The seats in each constituency are apportioned according to the largest average method of proportional representation (PR), conceived by the Belgian mathematician Victor d'Hondt in 1899. Although there is no statutory threshold for participation in the allocation of Assembly seats, the application of the d'Hondt method introduces a de facto threshold at the constituency level.[4]

Parties

The parties represented in Parliament are:

Political party Leader Political spectrum Political groups of the European Parliament
Social Democratic Party (PPD/PSD) Pedro Passos Coelho Centre-right European People's Party Group (EPP)
Socialist Party (PS) António Costa Centre-left Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats (S&D)
Left Bloc (BE) Catarina Martins Left-wing European United Left–Nordic Green Left (GUE/NGL)
CDS – People's Party (CDS-PP) Assunção Cristas Centre-right to Right-wing European People's Party Group (EPP)
Unitary Democratic Coalition (CDU)
Portuguese Communist Party (PCP)
Ecologist Party "The Greens" (PEV)
Jerónimo de Sousa Left-wing European United Left–Nordic Green Left (GUE/NGL)
People-Animals-Nature (PAN) André Silva Centre-left No members of European Parliament

Opinion polling

See also

Notes

  1. 1 2 The Social Democratic Party (PSD) and the People's Party (CDS–PP) contested the 2015 election in a coalition called Portugal Ahead and won a combined 38.6% of the vote and elected 107 MP's to parliament.

References

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