Far-right surge in legislative elections spells end to Portuguese exception

Posted by: 03/11/2024 – 9:42 pm

5 minutes

“There are over a million of us in Portugal!” In front of his cheering supporters, Andre Ventura is excited. Jananjaka Sega Party leader welcomed. During a meeting On Sunday evening, there were good results from his camp, which collected 18% of the votes during the preliminary assembly elections on March 10.

After almost all the votes were counted, Sega – which means “enough” in Portuguese – finished third on the ballot. The far-right party needs to win at least 48 seats in the 230-seat parliament. An impressive surge as it quadrupled its score compared to the previous 2022 election (7.2% of votes).

The election carries “considerable” weight, notes historian Yves Leonard, author of Sci-Fi and expert on contemporary Portugal. “This decision raises many questions just weeks before the 50th commemoration^e The anniversary of the Carnation Revolution, which ended the Salazar dictatorship, and Sega takes on a limited number of themes”.

In 2019, a few months after founding Sega, André Ventura entered parliament as a deputy, leading a Salazarist campaign under the slogan “God, Fatherland, Family and Work”. Notes the president tried to erase during this new election.

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Racist, anti-Gypsy and anti-immigrant sentiments

“Sega wants to create a kind of national story that underlines Yves Leonard in very ancient times, in the Middle Ages. This is the story that the Salazar dictatorship used in its time”.

Admirer of Donald Trump, Jair Bolsonaro and Matteo Salvini, Andre Ventura. Appears willingly with Marine Le Pen, refuses to be classified as right-wing. He has tried to moderate his speech during the campaign, putting aside the racist, anti-Roma and anti-immigrant comments that have dogged him in recent years.

In 2020, Member of Parliament Attacked a black MP, Josin Qatar Moreira asks, “She should return to her native country”, Guinea-Bissau. During the Covid-19 pandemic, he caused an uproar after announcing Roma should be sent to camps They are said to be a vector of ill health, disease.

Corruption scandals fueled Sega

“Until recently, Portugal was one of the few European countries without a successful far-right party,” notes Marta Lorimer, a researcher in European politics at the European Institute's London School of Economics. Sega's progress took everyone by surprise, marking an exceptional result for the Portuguese. According to him, the economic success was due to the “corruption scandals that have plagued other political parties”.

Considered a widespread problem by many voters, corruption emerged as one of the main themes of this election. A predictable turn of events since these early legislative elections were called after a series of corruption scandals led to the resignation of former Socialist Prime Minister Antonio Costa.

Read moreElections in Portugal: Vote Parasited by Corruption Scandals

Sega rode on this anti-corruption dynamic to position itself as a “white champion of democracy and anti-establishment rhetoric,” Yves Leonard explains, promising to “clean up.”

Football and social networks

The Portuguese far-right also owes its meteoric rise to its leader, who has dominated media space and social networks for years. Andre Ventura, a law professor, became famous as a debater on television sets dedicated to football, particularly commenting on Benfica matches.

According to Yves Leonard, the majority of Sega's voters are young people under the age of 34. “Voters are being seduced by the unrestrained use of social networks, which the party has masterfully handled,” he explains.

Read more“Do something!” : In Portugal, young people are overwhelmed by the housing crisis

Added to this was the “normalization of far-right discourse”, which led to a certain number of voters taking up the cry to vote for Sega, while they had hitherto been sheltered from voting. According to official figures, 66.24% of registered Portuguese went to the polls on Sunday, the lowest turnout since 2005.

Sega at the door of power

Ahead of Sega, the center-right Democratic Alliance (AD) won 29.5% of the vote with 79 seats, while the PS won 28.7% of the vote and 77 representatives. Almost all the votes have been counted, but four seats remain to be reserved after the votes from abroad are counted. For now, the decision will not allow the winner to form a majority and Sega may have a role in forming the government.

André Ventura has already said that it is “available” for a “strong majority on the right” to “provide Portugal with a stable government”, which AD's president Luis Montenegro has denied. Forming a government without inviting SEGA will be a challenge in the coming weeks.

With AFP