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1979 Portuguese legislative election

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1979 Portuguese legislative election

← 1976 2 December 1979 1980 →

250 seats to the Portuguese Assembly
125 seats needed for a majority
Registered7,249,346 Increase10.4%
Turnout6,007,453 (82.9%)
Decrease0.6 pp
  First party Second party Third party
 
Francisco Sá Carneiro.jpg
Mário Soares 1975b (cropped).jpg
Alvaro Cunhal 1980 (cropped).jpg
Leader Francisco Sá Carneiro Mário Soares Álvaro Cunhal
Party PSD PS PCP
Alliance AD APU
Leader since 2 July 1978[a] 19 April 1973 14 April 1978
Leader's seat Lisbon Lisbon Lisbon
Last election 115 seats, 40.9%[b] 107 seats, 34.9% 40 seats, 14.4%
Seats before 110 105 34
Seats won 128 74 47
Seat change Increase 18* Decrease 31* Increase 13*
Popular vote 2,719,208 1,642,136 1,129,322
Percentage 45.3% 27.3% 18.8%
Swing Increase 4.4 pp Decrease 7.6 pp Increase 4.4 pp


Prime Minister before election

Maria de Lurdes Pintasilgo
PS

Prime Minister after election

Francisco Sá Carneiro
PSD

The 1979 Portuguese legislative election took place on 2 December. The election renewed all 250 members of the Assembly of the Republic, 13 seats less than those elected in 1976.

The 3 years prior to the election were very unstable with Prime Minister Mário Soares' government collapsing in August 1978 and being succeeded by three Presidential appointed governments, in which the first two also collapsed due to lack of Parliamentary support. In the summer of 1979, President of Portugal António Ramalho Eanes dissolved Parliament and called an election for 2 December 1979 and, until the elections, the President nominated Maria de Lourdes Pintasilgo, the first and still only woman to lead a government in Portugal, as Prime Minister.

In the elections, the right-wing parties, the Social Democratic Party, the Democratic and Social Center and the People's Monarchist Party united in the Democratic Alliance (Portuguese: Aliança Democrática or AD) under the leadership of Sá Carneiro won the election, receiving 45 percent of the votes and an absolute majority in seats. The Socialists lost more than 30 MPs and the Communists, now allied with the Portuguese Democratic Movement in the United People Alliance achieved their highest total ever, with almost 20 v of the voting.

Turnout dropped slightly to 82.6 percent, but the number of ballots cast surpassed 6 million.

Background

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Fall of the government

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In the last election, three and a half years before, in April 1976, the Socialist Party, under the lead of Mário Soares, won the elections and became the Prime-Minister of the 1st Constitutional Government after the revolution.

However, the Government suffered several attacks and in December 1977, Soares lost a voting of confidence in Parliament, 159 to 100, as all Opposition parties, the Democratic and Social Center, the Social Democrats and the Communists united in order to vote against it, and so, the Soares' government fell. Soares would become Prime Minister again in January 1978, in coalition with the Democratic Social Center, but in July this party would force the end of the government due to disagreements about agrarian reforms. In August, Nobre da Costa became Prime Minister by personal decision of the President of President Ramalho Eanes, after a failed attempt to unite the parties on the Parliament. However, the program of Nobre da Costa's government was never approved and two months later, Nobre da Costa was replaced by Mota Pinto who would govern with extreme difficulties for less than one year.

In July 1979, the President finally decided to dissolve the Parliament and call for a new election for December. Mota Pinto was replaced in the period between the dissolution and the election by Maria de Lourdes Pintasilgo (the only women to lead a government in Portugal).

Leadership changes and challenges

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PSD 1978 leadership election

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The PSD suffered a lot of internal division after the 1976 election. The party was essential divided between those who want the party to pursue a more social democratic path, and those who want a more centrist to center-right approach, these aligned with Francisco Sá Carneiro.[1] Because of these disputes, Sá Carneiro leaves the leadership in November 1977, and is succeeded by António Sousa Franco, who leads the party more to the left.[2] But, internal divisions continue, and in June 1978, a group of 42 PSD MPs release the "Unpostponable Options" manifesto where they attack Sá Carneiro and reaffirm the Social Democratic path with the candidacy to the Socialist International.[3] Sá Carneiro returns to the leadership in the 1978 July party congress and 37 PSD MPs leave definitely the party and form the Independent Social Democratic Action (ASDI), which will merge with the PS a few years later.[4]

Ballot: 2 July 1978
Candidate Votes %
Francisco Sá Carneiro 100.0
Turnout
Source:

A few months after the congress that reinstated Sá Carneiro in the party's leadership, the PSD, CDS and PPM reach an agreement to form the Democratic Alliance, in order to contest the following elections.[5]

Electoral system

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The Assembly of the Republic has 250 members elected to four-year terms. The total number of MPs was reduced to 250 from the previous 263, elected in 1976. 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 126 (absolute majority) for both the Government's Programme to be rejected or for a motion of no confidence to be approved.[6]

The number of seats assigned to each district depends on the district magnitude.[7] 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.[8]

For these elections, and compared with the 1976 elections, the MPs distributed by districts were the following:[9]

District Number of MPs Map
Lisbon(–2) 56
Porto 38
Setúbal 17
Aveiro and Braga 15
Santarém(–1) and Coimbra 12
Leiria 11
Viseu(–1) 10
Faro 9
Castelo Branco(–1), Viana do Castelo(–1) and Vila Real(–1) 6
Azores(–1), Beja(–1), Évora(–1), Guarda(–1) and Madeira(–1) 5
Bragança(–1) and Portalegre 4
Europe and Outside Europe 2

Parties

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The table below lists the parties represented in the Assembly of the Republic during the first half of the 1st legislature (1976–1980), as this election was a national by-election, and that also contested the elections:

With the 1976 seat distribution

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Name Ideology Political position Leader 1976 result Seats at
dissolution[10]
% Seats
PS Socialist Party
Partido Socialista
Social democracy Centre-left Mário Soares 34.9%
107 / 263
98 / 263
PPD/PSD Social Democratic Party
Partido Social Democrata
Liberal
conservatism
Centre-right Francisco Sá Carneiro 24.4%
[c]
73 / 263
36 / 263
CDS Democratic and Social Center
Centro Democrático e Social
Christian democracy Centre-right
to right-wing
Diogo Freitas do Amaral 16.0%
[c]
42 / 263
40 / 263
PCP Portuguese Communist Party
Partido Comunista Português
Communism Far-left Álvaro Cunhal 14.4%
[d]
40 / 263
40 / 263
UDP Popular Democratic Union
União Democrática Popular
Marxism
Socialism
Left-wing Mário Tomé 1.7%
1 / 263
1 / 263
ASDI Independent Social Democratic Action
Acção Social Democrata Independente
Democratic Socialism
Social democracy
Centre-left António de Sousa Franco N/A
42 / 263

1976 results with the new seat distribution

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Name Ideology Political position Leader 1976 notional result
% Seats
PS Socialist Party
Partido Socialista
Social democracy Centre-left Mário Soares 34.9%
105 / 250
PPD/PSD Social Democratic Party
Partido Social Democrata
Liberal conservatism Centre-right Francisco Sá Carneiro 24.4%
70 / 250
CDS Democratic and Social Center
Centro Democrático e Social
Christian democracy Centre-right
to right-wing
Diogo Freitas do Amaral 16.0%
40 / 250
PCP Portuguese Communist Party
Partido Comunista Português
Communism Far-left Álvaro Cunhal 14.4%
34 / 250
UDP Popular Democratic Union
União Democrática Popular
Marxism
Socialism
Left-wing Mário Tomé 1.7%
1 / 250

Campaign period

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Party slogans

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Party or alliance Original slogan English translation Refs
AD « A maioria certa » "The right majority" [11]
PS « O direito à liberdade » "The right to freedom" [12]
APU « Para a vitória democrática » "For the democratic victory" [13]
UDP « O voto certo da mudança » "The right vote for change" [14]

National summary of votes and seats

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Summary of the 2 December 1979 Assembly of the Republic elections results
Parties Votes % ± Seats MPs %/
votes %
1976 1979 ± % ±
Democratic Alliance[e] 2,554,458 42.52 121 48.40 1.14
Social Democratic[f] 141,227 2.35 73 7 2.80 1.19
Democratic and Social Centre[f] 23,523 0.39 42 0 0.00 0.0
Total Democratic Alliance[b] 2,719,208 45.26 Increase4.4 115 128 Increase13 51.20 Increase7.5 1.13
Socialist 1,642,136 27.33 Decrease7.6 107 74 Decrease33 29.60 Decrease11.1 1.08
United People Alliance[g] 1,129,322 18.80 Increase4.4 40 47 Increase7 18.80 Increase3.6 1.00
People's Democratic Union 130,842 2.18 Increase0.5 1 1 Steady0 0.40 Steady0.0 0.18
Christian Democratic 72,514 1.21 Increase0.7 0 0 Steady0 0.00 Steady0.0 0.0
Portuguese Workers' Communist 53,268 0.89 Increase0.2 0 0 Steady0 0.00 Steady0.0 0.0
UEDS 43,325 0.72 0 0.00 0.0
Revolutionary Socialist 36,978 0.62 Increase0.5 0 0 Steady0 0.00 Steady0.0 0.0
Workers Party of Socialist Unity 12,713 0.21 0 0.00 0.0
OCMLP 3,433 0.06 0 0.00 0.0
Total valid 5,843,739 97.28 Increase2.0 263 250 Decrease13 100.00 Steady0.0
Blank ballots 42,863 0.71
Invalid ballots 120,851 2.01 Decrease2.7
Total 6,007,453 100.00
Registered voters/turnout 7,249,346 82.86 Decrease0.6
Source: Comissão Nacional de Eleições
Vote share
AD
42.52%
PS
27.33%
APU
18.80%
PSD
2.35%
UDP
2.18%
PDC
1.21%
PCTP/MRPP
0.89%
UEDS
0.72%
PSR
0.62%
Others
0.66%
Blank/Invalid
2.72%
Parliamentary seats
AD
48.40%
PS
29.60%
APU
18.80%
PSD
2.80%
UDP
0.40%

Distribution by constituency

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Results of the 1979 election of the Portuguese Assembly of the Republic
by constituency
Constituency % S % S % S % S % S Total
S
AD PS APU PSD UDP
Azores 30.0 2 3.1 - 52.0 3 1.7 - 5
Aveiro 56.7 9 28.4 5 7.9 1 1.2 - 15
Beja 19.0 1 22.0 1 50.7 3 1.8 - 5
Braga 51.9 9 30.2 5 10.0 1 1.4 - 15
Bragança 60.7 3 22.2 1 5.8 - 1.9 - 4
Castelo Branco 49.9 4 27.8 2 12.4 - 1.9 - 6
Coimbra 44.8 6 35.1 5 11.2 1 1.3 - 12
Évora 26.9 1 16.9 1 48.9 3 1.7 - 5
Faro 34.6 4 34.0 3 20.3 2 3.2 - 9
Guarda 60.6 4 26.3 1 5.4 - 0.9 - 5
Leiria 56.2 7 23.2 3 10.9 1 1.5 - 11
Lisbon 40.0 24 25.8 15 26.0 16 2.8 1 56
Madeira 17.2 1 3.1 - 57.8 4 6.6 - 5
Portalegre 32.1 2 29.8 1 29.4 1 1.7 - 4
Porto 44.5 18 34.8 14 14.5 6 1.9 - 38
Santarém 41.3 6 27.3 3 21.7 3 2.2 - 12
Setúbal 22.3 4 21.4 4 47.0 9 4.0 - 17
Viana do Castelo 54.8 4 24.9 2 9.8 - 0.9 - 6
Vila Real 57.7 4 21.4 2 6.1 - 1.5 - 6
Viseu 64.1 8 21.4 2 5.5 - 1.4 - 10
Europe 38.3 1 33.2 1 13.4 - 5.7 - 2
Rest of the World 77.3 2 5.7 - 3.1 - 0.7 - 2
Total 42.5 121 27.3 74 18.8 47 2.4 7 2.2 1 250
Source: Comissão Nacional de Eleições

Maps

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Notes

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  1. ^ As leader of the Social Democratic Party (PSD).
  2. ^ a b Democratic Alliance results are compared to the combined totals of the Social Democratic Party, the Democratic and Social Centre and the People's Monarchist Party in the 1976 election.
  3. ^ a b The Social Democratic Party (PSD), the Democratic Social Center (CDS) and the People's Monarchist Party (PPM) would contest the 1979 election in a coalition called Democratic Alliance (AD).
  4. ^ The Portuguese Communist Party (PCP) and the Portuguese Democratic Movement (MDP/CDE) would contest the 1979 election in a coalition called United People Alliance (APU).
  5. ^ Alliance formed by the Social Democratic Party (73 seats), the Democratic and Social Centre (43 seats) and the People's Monarchist Party (5 seats).
  6. ^ a b Social Democratic Party and Democratic and Social Centre electoral list only in Azores and Madeira.
  7. ^ Portuguese Communist Party (44 MPs) and Portuguese Democratic Movement (3 MPs) ran in coalition.

References

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  1. ^ "A guerra interna a Rui Rio e os "inadiáveis" contra Sá Carneiro", Diário de Notícias, 29 November 2018. Retrieved 8 June 2022.
  2. ^ " Partido Popular Democrático/ Partido Social-Democrata", José Adelino Maltez, 3 May 2007. Retrieved 8 June 2022.
  3. ^ " Opções Inadiáveis (1978)", José Adelino Maltez, 3 May 2007. Retrieved 8 June 2022.
  4. ^ " De condicionais a ASDI ", Público, 9 September 2018. Retrieved 8 June 2022.
  5. ^ "O que prometia a AD há 36 anos ", Observador, 27 April 2015. Retrieved 8 June 2022.
  6. ^ "Constitution of the Portuguese Republic" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2016-03-03. Retrieved 2019-12-29.
  7. ^ "Effective threshold in electoral systems". Trinity College, Dublin. Retrieved 2015-10-21.
  8. ^ Gallaher, Michael (1992). "Comparing Proportional Representation Electoral Systems: Quotas, Thresholds, Paradoxes and Majorities"
  9. ^ "Eleição da Assembleia da República de 2 de Dezembro de 1979". CNE - Comissão Nacional de Eleições - Eleição da Assembleia da República de 2 de Dezembro de 1979. Retrieved 3 December 2020.
  10. ^ Composição dos Grupos Parlamentares/Partidos
  11. ^ "ELEIÇÕES LEGISLATIVAS INTERCALARES DE 1979 – ALIANÇA DEMOCRÁTICA". EPHEMERA (in Portuguese). Retrieved 12 May 2020.
  12. ^ "ELEIÇÕES LEGISLATIVAS DE 1979 – PS". EPHEMERA (in Portuguese). Retrieved 12 May 2020.
  13. ^ "ALIANÇA POVO UNIDO (APU) – 1979 / ELEIÇÕES INTERCALARES DE 1979 – APU". EPHEMERA (in Portuguese). Retrieved 12 May 2020.
  14. ^ "UDP – 1979". EPHEMERA (in Portuguese). Retrieved 12 May 2020.
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See also

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