Portuguese legislative election, 1979
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250 seats to the Portuguese Assembly 125 seats needed for a majority | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Registered |
7,249,346 ![]() | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Turnout |
6,007,453 (82.9%)![]() | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The first and the second most voted parties in each district (Azores and Madeira are not shown) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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This article is part of the series: |
Politics and government of Portugal |
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Portugal |
The Portuguese legislative election of 1979 took place on 2 December. The last election, three and a half years before, in April 1976, was won by the Socialist Party under the lead of Mário Soares, who became the Prime-Minister of the 1st Constitutional government after the revolution.
However, the government suffered several attacks and in December 1977, Soares lost the voting of a confidence resolution because all the opposition, 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 reform. 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, 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).
The right-wing parties, the Social Democratic, the Democratic and Social Center and the People's Monarchist Party united in the Democratic Alliance (Portuguese: Aliança Democrática or AD) under the lead of Sá Carneiro won the election, receiving 43% of the vote. 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% of the voting.
Electoral system
The Parliament of the Portuguese Republic consists of a single chamber, the Assembly of the Republic, composed of 250 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 require majority support in the Assembly in order to remain in office.
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 246 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 divided among parties 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, there is an effective threshold at the constituency level that depends on the district magnitude.[3] The use of the d'Hondt method makes for a higher effective threshold than certain other allocation method such as the Hare quota or Sainte-Laguë method, which are more generous to small parties.[4]
Parties
The major parties involved and the respective leaders:
- United People Alliance (APU), Álvaro Cunhal
- Socialist Party (PS), Mário Soares
- Democratic Alliance (AD), Francisco Sá Carneiro
The leader of the Democratic Alliance, Francisco Sá Carneiro, member of the Social Democratic Party was nominated Prime-Minister.
National summary of votes and seats
Parties | Votes | % | ± | Seats | MPs %/ votes % | ||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1976 | 1979 | ± | % | ± | |||||||
Democratic Alliance[A] | 2,554,458 | 42.52 | N/A | N/A | 121 | N/A | 48.40 | N/A | 1.14 | ||
Social Democratic[B] | 141,227 | 2.35 | N/A | 73 | 7 | N/A | 2.80 | N/A | 1.19 | ||
Democratic and Social Centre[B] | 23,523 | 0.39 | N/A | 42 | 0 | N/A | 0.00 | N/A | 0.0 | ||
Total Democratic Alliance | 2,719,208 | 45.26 | ![]() |
1151 | 128 | ![]() |
51.20 | ![]() |
1.13 | ||
Socialist | 1,642,136 | 27.33 | ![]() | 107 | 74 | ![]() | 29.60 | ![]() | 1.08 | ||
United People Alliance[C] | 1,129,322 | 18.80 | ![]() | 40 | 47 | ![]() | 18.80 | ![]() | 1.00 | ||
People's Democratic Union | 130,842 | 2.18 | ![]() | 1 | 1 | ![]() | 0.40 | ![]() | 0.18 | ||
Christian Democratic | 72,514 | 1.21 | ![]() | 0 | 0 | ![]() | 0.00 | ![]() | 0.0 | ||
Workers' Communist Party | 53,268 | 0.89 | ![]() | 0 | 0 | ![]() | 0.00 | ![]() | 0.0 | ||
UEDS | 43,325 | 0.72 | N/A | N/A | 0 | N/A | 0.00 | N/A | 0.0 | ||
Revolutionary Socialist | 36,978 | 0.62 | ![]() | 0 | 0 | ![]() | 0.00 | ![]() | 0.0 | ||
Workers Party of Socialist Unity | 12,713 | 0.21 | N/A | N/A | 0 | N/A | 0.00 | N/A | 0.0 | ||
OCMLP | 3,433 | 0.06 | N/A | N/A | 0 | N/A | 0.00 | N/A | 0.0 | ||
Total valid | 5,843,739 | 97.28 | ![]() |
263 | 250 | ![]() |
100.00 | ![]() |
— | ||
Blank ballots | 42,863 | 0.71 | — | ||||||||
Invalid ballots | 120,851 | 2.01 | ![]() | ||||||||
Total (turnout 82.86%) | 6,007,453 | 100.00 | ![]() | ||||||||
A Alliance formed by the Social Democratic Party (73 seats), the Democratic and Social Centre (43 seats) and the People's Monarchist Party (5 seats). B Social Democratic Party and Democratic and Social Centre electoral list only in Azores and Madeira. C Portuguese Communist Party (44 MPs) and Portuguese Democratic Movement (3 MPs) ran in coalition.[5] | |||||||||||
Source: Comissão Nacional de Eleições |
1 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.
Distribution 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
- Most voted political force by municipality.
Notes
- ↑ As leader of the Social Democratic Party (PSD).
References
- ↑ Diário da Républica, 24 de Dezembro de 1979 - Lista de candidatos eleitos
- ↑ Fundação Mário Soares
- ↑ "Effective threshold in electoral systems". Trinity College, Dublin. Retrieved 2015-10-21.
- ↑ Gallaher, Michael (1992). "Comparing Proportional Representation Electoral Systems: Quotas, Thresholds, Paradoxes and Majorities"
- ↑ "Electoral results - Assembly of the Republic". Archived from the original on 2012-07-16. Retrieved 2012-09-02.