2005 Portuguese legislative election
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The 2005 Portuguese legislative election took place on 20 February. The election renewed all 230 members of the Assembly of the Republic.
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Registered8,944,508 
0.5%
0.5%Turnout5,747,834 (64.3%)
2.8 pp
2.8 pp | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
20 February 2005
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All 230 seats in the Assembly of the Republic 116 seats needed for a majority | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Opinion polls | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Registered | 8,944,508 0.5% | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Turnout | 5,747,834 (64.3%) 2.8 pp | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The election was called following President Jorge Sampaio's decision, on 30 November 2004, to dissolve the Parliament as an answer to the political instability caused by the government led by Pedro Santana Lopes (PSD) in coalition with the CDS–PP.
Headed by José Sócrates, the centre-left Socialist Party (PS) won the election by a landslide, winning in 19 of the 22 electoral constituencies, including in districts such as Viseu and Bragança that historically voted for the right. The Socialist Party conquered its first absolute majority, receiving 45 percent of the electorate vote and 52 percent of the seats in the Parliament, making this the Socialists' largest ever victory in terms of vote percentage and seat count as of 2022.
The centre-right parties, mainly the Social Democrats, were punished for their performance in government, and lost more than 11 percentage points they had garnered in the previous election. On the left, the Left Bloc achieved its best result ever and made the biggest climb, gaining 5 MPs, while the CDU (Communists and the Greens) gained 2 MPs and reversed their downward trend of the last elections.
Voter turnout was the highest since 1995, as 64.3 percent of the electorate cast a ballot.
Background
In the aftermath of the 2002 legislative election, PSD and CDS–PP formed a coalition government, the first coalition between both parties in nearly 20 years.[1] During this period, several events dominated the coalition's term in office: The weak economic situation of the country; Portugal becoming a major ally of the United States in the War in Iraq, which split public opinion;[2] And the Casa Pia child sexual abuse scandal, during 2003, in which several high-profile names, from celebrities to Socialist members very close to party's leadership, then chaired by Eduardo Ferro Rodrigues, were arrested.[3]
After more than two years in office, Prime Minister José Manuel Durão Barroso announced, in June 2004, that he was resigning from office in order to become President of the European Commission.[4] Pedro Santana Lopes succeeded Durão Barroso as Prime Minister.[5]
Fall of the government
Deep disagreements and disputes within the Social Democratic Party, coupled with poor administration, began to derail the government led by Pedro Santana Lopes, the successor of Durão Barroso as prime minister.[6] One of them broke in October 2004, the so-called "Caso Marcelo", regarding former PSD leader Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa's TVI punditry show, which ended abruptly with him accusing TVI's management of pressuring him not to be too critical of the then PSD/CDS–PP government in his television commentaries,[7][8] being considered as an attack on freedom of the press.[9] Problems at the start of the 2004 school year, due to issues related to teacher allocation, also hampered the government.[10]
Another major dispute was the resignation of Youth and Sports Minister, Henrique Chaves, which was a close ally of Santana, and precipitated the fall of the government, as Chaves accused Santana of not being "loyal and truthful".[11] Following this, President Jorge Sampaio had "enough" of crises and accused the government of "contradictions and lack of coordination that contributed to its discredit".[12] Therefore, Sampaio used his power of dissolution of Parliament and called a snap election, the only time till date such extreme power was used by a president in Portuguese democracy.[13][14] A new election was called, by the President, for February 2005.[15]
Leadership changes and challenges
Social Democratic Party
Following the resignation of José Manuel Durão Barroso as Prime Minister and PSD leader, the Social Democratic Party (PSD) initiated the process to elect a new leader.[16] Pedro Santana Lopes, by then Mayor of Lisbon, was the sole candidate for the leadership[17] and his name was overwhelmingly confirmed in a National Party Council meeting on 1 July 2004.[18] The results were the following:
| Candidate | Votes | % | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pedro Santana Lopes | 98 | 97.0 | |
| Against | 3 | 3.0 | |
| Turnout | 101 | ||
| Source: Results | |||
Two weeks later, on 17 July 2004, Santana Lopes was sworn in as Prime Minister.[5]
Socialist Party
On early July 2004, PS leader Eduardo Ferro Rodrigues resigned from the leadership against President Jorge Sampaio decision to nominate Pedro Santana Lopes as Prime Minister, following the resignation of Durão Barroso, rather than calling a snap legislative election.[19] New elections to select a new leader were called for 25 and 26 September 2004. Former environment minister José Sócrates, Manuel Alegre and the son of former President Mário Soares, João Soares, contested the leadership ballot.[20] José Sócrates was elected by a landslide[21] and the results were the following:
| Candidate | Votes | % | |
|---|---|---|---|
| José Sócrates | 28,984 | 79.5 | |
| Manuel Alegre | 5,693 | 15.6 | |
| João Soares | 1,505 | 4.1 | |
| Blank/Invalid ballots | 271 | 0.7 | |
| Turnout | 36,453 | 48.20 | |
| Source: Results[22] | |||
Portuguese Communist Party
In the fall of 2004, PCP leader Carlos Carvalhas decided to step down from the party's leadership after 12 years in the post.[23] Jerónimo de Sousa was selected as candidate for the leadership and was elected in the party's congress during the weekend of 27 and 28 November 2004.[24] The results were the following:
| Candidate | Votes | % | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jerónimo de Sousa | 164 | 93.7 | |
| Against | 1 | 0.6 | |
| Abstention | 10 | 5.7 | |
| Turnout | 175 | ||
| Source: Results | |||
Electoral system
The Assembly of the Republic has 230 members elected to four-year terms. 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.[25]
The number of seats assigned to each district depends on the district magnitude.[26] The use of the d'Hondt method makes for a higher effective threshold than certain other allocation methods such as the Hare quota or Sainte-Laguë method, which are more generous to small parties.[27]
For these elections, and compared with the 2002 elections, the MPs distributed by districts were the following:[28]
| District | Number of MPs | Map |
|---|---|---|
| Lisbon | 48 | 
18
6
38
5
4
15
9
4
10
5
10
10
48
2
3
17
3
8
6
5
2
2
|
| Porto | 38 | |
| Braga | 18 | |
| Setúbal | 17 | |
| Aveiro | 15 | |
| Leiria, Santarém and Coimbra | 10 | |
| Viseu | 9 | |
| Faro | 8 | |
| Madeira(+1) and Viana do Castelo | 6 | |
| Azores, Castelo Branco and Vila Real | 5 | |
| Bragança and Guarda | 4 | |
| Beja and Évora | 3 | |
| Portalegre(–1), Europe and Outside Europe | 2 |
Parties
Having been in a governing coalition for the past 3 years, the possibility of a PSD/CDS–PP coalition was debated, but it generated many divisions within the Social Democrats (PSD) and the idea was abandoned.[29] Despite this, the PSD signed an agreement with the Earth Party (MPT) and the People's Monarchist Party (PPM), in which it would accept the inclusion of some members of these parties on the PSD's electoral lists.[30] The table below lists the parties represented in the Assembly of the Republic during the 9th legislature (2002–2005) and that also partook in the election:
| Name | Ideology | Political position | Leader | 2002 result | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| % | Seats | ||||||
| PPD/PSD | Social Democratic Party Partido Social Democrata |
Conservatism Classical liberalism |
Centre-right | Pedro Santana Lopes | 40.2% | 105 / 230 | |
| PS | Socialist Party Partido Socialista |
Social democracy Third Way |
Centre-left to Centre | José Sócrates | 37.8% | 96 / 230 | |
| CDS–PP | CDS – People's Party Centro Democrático e Social – Partido Popular |
Christian democracy Conservatism |
Centre-right to right-wing |
Paulo Portas | 8.7% | 14 / 230 | |
| PCP | Portuguese Communist Party Partido Comunista Português |
Communism Marxism–Leninism |
Far-left | Jerónimo de Sousa | 6.9% [a] |
10 / 230 | |
| PEV | Ecologist Party "The Greens" Partido Ecologista "Os Verdes" |
Eco-socialism Green politics |
Left-wing | Heloísa Apolónia | 2 / 230 | ||
| BE | Left Bloc Bloco de Esquerda |
Democratic socialism Anti-capitalism |
Left-wing | Francisco Louçã | 2.7% | 3 / 230 | |
Campaign period
Issues
The campaign started officially on 6 February and the major topics were the problematic state of the country's finances, unemployment, abortion and even José Sócrates' alleged homosexuality.[31][32] The Socialist Party (PS) campaign focused more on Sócrates' leadership attributes rather than in real policies,[33] refusing to announce tax cuts but, however, promising to create thousands of new jobs.[34][35] On the other hand, the PSD campaign was marked by internal divisions and the weak leadership image conveyed by Pedro Santana Lopes as Prime Minister.[33] The campaign was also noticeable, during its last few days, for the forced absence of Unitary Democratic Coalition (CDU) leader Jerónimo de Sousa due to losing his voice,[36] and the suspension of some campaign events, mostly by right-wing parties, following the death of Sister Lúcia.[37]
Party slogans
| Party or alliance | Original slogan | English translation | Refs | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSD | « Por amor a Portugal. » | "For love of Portugal" | [38] | |
| PS | « Voltar a acreditar em Portugal » | "Believing in Portugal again" | [39] | |
| CDS–PP | « O voto útil para Portugal » | "The useful vote for Portugal" | [40] | |
| CDU | « Agora é consigo » | "Now it's up to you" | [41] | |
| BE | « Faz toda a diferença » | "It makes all the difference" | [42] | |
Candidates' debates
| 2005 Portuguese legislative election debates | |||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Date | Organisers | Moderator(s) | P Present A Absent invitee N Non-invitee | ||||||||||||||||||
| PSD Santana |
PS Sócrates |
CDS–PP Portas |
CDU Jerónimo |
BE Louçã |
Refs | ||||||||||||||||
| 18 Jan | SIC Notícias | N | N | N | P | P | [43] | ||||||||||||||
| 20 Jan | SIC Notícias | N | N | P | N | P | [44] | ||||||||||||||
| 25 Jan | SIC Notícias | N | N | P | P | N | [43] | ||||||||||||||
| 3 Feb | RTP2, SIC, Antena 1, TSF |
Maria Flor Pedroso Rodrigo Guedes de Carvalho José Gomes Ferreira Ricardo Costa |
P | P | N | N | N | [45] | |||||||||||||
| 15 Feb | RTP1 | Judite de Sousa José Alberto Carvalho |
P | P | P | P | P | [46] | |||||||||||||
| Candidate viewed as "most convincing" in each debate | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Date | Organisers | Polling firm/Link | |||||||||||||||||||
| PSD | PS | CDS–PP | CDU | BE | Notes | ||||||||||||||||
| 3 Feb | RTP2, SIC, Antena 1, TSF | Aximage | 20.2 | 50.4 | N/a | N/a | N/a | 29.6% Tie | |||||||||||||
Opinion polling
View source data.
Voter turnout
Results
National summary
 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Votes | % | +/– | Seats | +/– | |
| Socialist Party | 2,588,312 | 45.03 | +7.23 | 121 | +25 | |
| Social Democratic Party[b] | 1,653,425 | 28.77 | –11.44 | 75 | –30 | |
| Unitary Democratic Coalition[c] | 433,369 | 7.54 | +0.60 | 14 | +2 | |
| CDS – People's Party | 416,415 | 7.24 | –1.48 | 12 | –2 | |
| Left Bloc | 364,971 | 6.35 | +3.61 | 8 | +5 | |
| Portuguese Workers' Communist Party | 48,186 | 0.84 | +0.18 | 0 | 0 | |
| New Democracy Party | 40,358 | 0.70 | New | 0 | New | |
| Humanist Party | 17,056 | 0.30 | +0.09 | 0 | 0 | |
| National Renovator Party | 9,374 | 0.16 | +0.07 | 0 | 0 | |
| Workers' Party of Socialist Unity | 5,535 | 0.10 | +0.02 | 0 | 0 | |
| Democratic Party of the Atlantic | 1,618 | 0.03 | New | 0 | New | |
| Total | 5,578,619 | 100.00 | – | 230 | 0 | |
| Valid votes | 5,578,619 | 97.06 | –0.97 | |||
| Invalid votes | 65,515 | 1.14 | +0.18 | |||
| Blank votes | 103,537 | 1.80 | +0.79 | |||
| Total votes | 5,747,671 | 100.00 | – | |||
| Registered voters/turnout | 8,944,508 | 64.26 | +2.79 | |||
| Source: Comissão Nacional de Eleições | ||||||
Distribution by constituency
| Constituency | % | S | % | S | % | S | % | S | % | S | Total S |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PS | PSD | CDU | CDS-PP | BE | |||||||
| Azores | 53.1 | 3 | 34.4 | 2 | 1.7 | - | 4.0 | - | 2.9 | - | 5 |
| Aveiro | 41.1 | 8 | 35.7 | 6 | 3.5 | - | 9.8 | 1 | 5.1 | - | 15 |
| Beja | 51.0 | 2 | 12.3 | - | 24.1 | 1 | 2.9 | - | 4.7 | - | 3 |
| Braga | 45.4 | 9 | 32.9 | 7 | 4.8 | 1 | 7.8 | 1 | 4.6 | - | 18 |
| Bragança | 42.1 | 2 | 39.0 | 2 | 2.0 | - | 9.7 | - | 2.5 | - | 4 |
| Castelo Branco | 56.0 | 4 | 26.7 | 1 | 3.8 | - | 5.3 | - | 3.7 | - | 5 |
| Coimbra | 45.4 | 6 | 31.9 | 4 | 5.5 | - | 5.5 | - | 6.3 | - | 10 |
| Évora | 49.7 | 2 | 16.7 | - | 20.9 | 1 | 3.7 | - | 4.6 | - | 3 |
| Faro | 49.3 | 6 | 24.6 | 2 | 6.9 | - | 5.8 | - | 7.7 | - | 8 |
| Guarda | 46.8 | 2 | 34.7 | 2 | 2.9 | - | 7.0 | - | 3.4 | - | 4 |
| Leiria | 35.6 | 4 | 39.8 | 5 | 4.6 | - | 8.9 | 1 | 5.5 | - | 10 |
| Lisbon | 44.1 | 23 | 23.7 | 12 | 9.8 | 5 | 8.2 | 4 | 8.8 | 4 | 48 |
| Madeira | 35.0 | 3 | 45.2 | 3 | 3.6 | - | 6.6 | - | 3.8 | - | 6 |
| Portalegre | 54.9 | 2 | 20.2 | - | 12.1 | - | 4.2 | - | 4.6 | - | 2 |
| Porto | 48.5 | 20 | 27.8 | 12 | 5.4 | 2 | 6.9 | 2 | 6.7 | 2 | 38 |
| Santarém | 46.1 | 6 | 26.4 | 3 | 8.6 | 1 | 6.9 | - | 6.5 | - | 10 |
| Setúbal | 43.6 | 8 | 16.1 | 3 | 20.0 | 3 | 5.1 | 1 | 10.3 | 2 | 17 |
| Viana do Castelo | 42.0 | 3 | 33.5 | 2 | 3.8 | - | 11.4 | 1 | 4.5 | - | 6 |
| Vila Real | 43.8 | 3 | 40.2 | 2 | 2.6 | - | 6.8 | - | 2.4 | - | 5 |
| Viseu | 40.4 | 4 | 40.2 | 4 | 2.2 | - | 8.6 | 1 | 3.3 | - | 9 |
| Europe | 54.3 | 1 | 27.2 | 1 | 4.2 | - | 3.4 | - | 2.3 | - | 2 |
| Outside Europe | 26.3 | - | 57.7 | 2 | 1.0 | - | 3.5 | - | 0.7 | - | 2 |
| Total | 45.0 | 121 | 28.8 | 75 | 7.5 | 14 | 7.2 | 12 | 6.4 | 8 | 230 |
| Source: Comissão Nacional de Eleições | |||||||||||
Maps
Winner and seats by constituency.
First and second most voted political force by constituency.
Most voted political force by municipality.
Share of vote for CDU by district.
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Graphics
Seats won by party.
Gains and losses by party.
Share of vote by party.
See also
Further reading
- Freire, André; Marina Costa Lobo (May 2006). "The Portuguese 2005 legislative election: Return to the left". West European Politics. 29 (3): 581–588. doi:10.1080/01402380600620742. S2CID 154260314.
Notes
- The Portuguese Communist Party (PCP) and the Ecologist Party "The Greens" (PEV) contested the 2002 election in a coalition called Unitary Democratic Coalition (CDU) and won a combined 6.9% of the vote and elected 12 MPs to parliament.
- From the Social Democratic electoral lists were elected two MPs from the People's Monarchist Party and other two MPs from Earth Party.
- Portuguese Communist Party (12 MPs) and "The Greens" (2 MPs).