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The abstention stayed away from the announced catastrophe. President reelected with more than 60 percentage points. The leader of Chega is worth more than the sum of the communist candidates and the blockade.
It was a resounding victory for Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa: because he reached 60.76% and because he got one hundred thousand more votes than five years ago, despite the increase in abstention. But there is a second winner of the election night: Chega’s leader, André Ventura (11.89%), was a little behind second place and the socialist Ana Gomes (12.92%).
To the left of the PS, the results were painful: the communist João Ferreira (4.33%) was behind the candidate of the Right even in the red bastions of Alentejo and Setúbal, while the blocker Marisa Matias (3.94%) He lost more than 300 thousand votes and was reduced to just over a third of what he obtained in 2016. The liberal Tiago Mayan reached 3.2% and Vitorino Silva (Tino de Rans) was last, with 2.95%.
It was even predicted that the pandemic would push abstention to stratospheric levels and that this could ruin the current president’s reelection party. It was not so. It is true that the abstention rate exceeded 60 percentage points, but it was due more to the automatic inclusion in the electoral roll of emigrants than to fear of COVID-19. With the population of the national territory mobilized, the victory was, as expected, weak: five years ago, Marcelo let 17 municipalities escape, this time he conquered the 308 municipalities of the country.
PS celebrated with Marcelo
A victory much celebrated by different political actors: by the leaders of the PSD and the CDS, as expected, but in particular by the Socialists. For those who do not remember, António Costa was the first to launch the reevaluation of Marcelo, in the media visit to Autoeuropa, in May last year. And yesterday Carlos César claimed credits for the PS.
Marcelo ended up fulfilling what was expected of a popular figure and of a president and candidate with the explicit or implicit support of the two parties of the so-called Central Bloc (PSD and PS). But there was a candidate who went far beyond the value of his party. Ventura had already been compared many times to the elephant in the room and yesterday he really broke the dishes.
The campaign in xenophobic tones (with successive attacks on the gypsies) and the insults to the opponents had no negative effects. He did not get second place, but, as he went on to emphasize, he is worth more than the communist and bloc candidates combined. Chega’s leader was, in fact, second in most of the country’s districts. It was the more urban and coastal vote that captured his greatest ambitions.
A result that confirms what was announced in recent months: a reconfiguration to the right is being carried out. The PS president took the opportunity, Sibilino, to conclude that “right-wing extremism” is not a political alternative for the country, but rather is “a greater threat” to the PSD. And it’s not the only one. Liberals also confirm the growing deployment, particularly in large urban centers: Tiago Mayan was well above average in Porto and Lisbon.
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