1987 Portuguese legislative election

The 1987 Portuguese legislative election took place on 19 July. The election renewed all 250 members of the Assembly of the Republic.

In the previous election, in 1985, the Social Democratic Party had won a minority government managing to survive with the confidence and supply of the Democratic and Social Center and the Democratic Renewal Party, but after the approval of a no-confidence motion from the left-wing parties, also with the support of the Democratic Renewal Party, the government fell. The PS tried to form a new government with the support of the PRD and CDU, but Mário Soares, the President at the time, rejected the idea and called for a new election.

The PSD was reelected in a landslide, winning a majority government with just over 50 percent of the votes and 148 of the 250 seats, a majority of 46. Not only was this the most seats that a Portuguese party had ever won in a free election, but it was the first time since the Carnation Revolution that a single party won an absolute majority. Although the PSD was leading in voting intentions going into the election, the size of its victory far exceeded the party's most optimistic expectations. The PSD won every district with the exception of Setúbal, Évora and Beja, which voted for the CDU.

The Socialist Party gained a few seats and got a slightly higher share of the vote, 22 percent compared with the almost 21 percent in 1985, but the scale of the PSD victory made the party lose most of its influence. Like in 1979, 1980 and 1985, the PS failed to win a single district. The left-wing Democratic Unity Coalition lost some of its MPs to the Socialist Party and the Democratic Renewal Party, now led by former President António Ramalho Eanes, lost all of its influence, mainly due to its responsibility in the fall of the former PSD minority government. The right-wing Democratic and Social Center lost almost half of its vote share, due to the effect of tactical voting for the also right-wing Social Democratic Party.

European elections were held on the same day.

Background

Fall of the government

In the first months of 1987, a trip of a Portuguese parliamentary delegation to the Soviet Union, which also passed by Estonia, a territory that wasn't recognized by Portugal as under Soviet control, created a diplomatic issue that was used by the Opposition to bring down Cavaco Silva's minority government. In April, Parliament approved, by a 134 to 108 vote, a motion of no confidence and the government fell. President Mário Soares refused the opposition's proposal, an alternative PS-PRD-PCP government, deciding to dissolve Parliament and call a snap election.

Leadership changes and challenges

The 1985 general election results were quite disappointing for CDS, and then party leader Francisco Lucas Pires resigned from the leadership. Adriano Moreira, supported by the more conservative wings, and João Morais Leitão, supported by the more "centrist" wings of the party, were the two candidates running for the leadership in the April 1986 congress. Adriano Moreira was elected new party leader by an 82-vote difference. The results are the following:

|- style="background-color:#E9E9E9"

! align="center" colspan=2 style="width: 60px"|Candidate

! align="center" style="width: 50px"|Votes

! align="center" style="width: 50px"|%

|bgcolor=|

| align=left | Adriano Moreira

| align=right | 533

| align=right | 54.2

|bgcolor=|

| align=left | João Morais Leitão

| align=right | 451

| align=right | 45.8

|- style="background-color:#E9E9E9"

| colspan=2 style="text-align:left;" | Turnout

| align=right |984

| align=center |

| colspan="4" align=left|Source: Results

Socialist Party

In the 1985 general election the PS nominated António Almeida Santos, while an interim leadership, headed by António Macedo, ruled the party, but the Socialists achieved their worst result ever, just 20.8 percent. A few months later, the PS supported candidate for the Presidency of the Republic, Mário Soares, was narrowly elected to that post by a 51 to 49 percent margin against Diogo Freitas do Amaral, the candidate supported by CDS and PSD. After that victory, the party called a party congress, for late June 1986, to elect a new leader. There were two candidates on the ballot, Vítor Constâncio and Jaime Gama. Vítor Constâncio was elected as new party leader.

|- style="background-color:#E9E9E9"

! align="center" colspan=2 style="width: 60px"|Candidate

! align="center" style="width: 50px"|Votes

! align="center" style="width: 50px"|%

|bgcolor=|

| align=left | Vítor Constâncio

| align=center |

| align=right | 79

|bgcolor=|

| align=left | Jaime Gama

| align=right |

| align=right | 21

|- style="background-color:#E9E9E9"

| colspan=2 style="text-align:left;" | Turnout

| align=right |

| align=center |

| colspan="4" align=left|Source: Acção Socialista

Democratic Renewal Party

The Democratic Renewal Party surprised with their excellent result in the 1985 election, winning almost 18 percent of the votes. António Ramalho Eanes, the main figure and inspiration for PRD, left the post of President of the Republic in March 1986, and, a few months later, in October of the same year, was unanimously elected as the new leader of the PRD, succeeding Hermínio Martinho.

|- style="background-color:#E9E9E9"

! align="center" colspan=2 style="width: 60px"|Candidate

! align="center" style="width: 50px"|Votes

! align="center" style="width: 50px"|%

|bgcolor=|

| align=left | António Ramalho Eanes

| colspan="2" align=right | Voice vote

|- style="background-color:#E9E9E9"

| colspan=2 style="text-align:left;" | Turnout

| align=right |

| align=right | 100.0

| colspan="4" align=left|Source:

Electoral system

The Assembly of the Republic has 250 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 126 (absolute majority) for both the Government's Programme to be rejected or for a motion of no confidence to be approved.

The number of seats assigned to each district depends on the district magnitude. 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.

For these elections, and compared with the 1985 elections, the MPs distributed by districts were the following:

{| class="wikitable"

! District !! Number of MPs !! Map

| Lisbon || style="text-align:center;"|56

| style="text-align:center;" rowspan="13"|

| Porto || style="text-align:center;"| 39

| Braga and Setúbal ||style="text-align:center;"| 17

| Aveiro ||style="text-align:center;"| 15

| Santarém ||style="text-align:center;"| 12

| Leiria and Coimbra ||style="text-align:center;"| 11

| Viseu ||style="text-align:center;"| 10

| Faro ||style="text-align:center;"| 9

| Castelo Branco, Viana do Castelo and Vila Real ||style="text-align:center;"| 6

| Azores, Beja, Guarda and Madeira ||style="text-align:center;"| 5

| Bragança and Évora||style="text-align:center;"| 4

| Portalegre ||style="text-align:center;"| 3

| Europe and Outside Europe ||style="text-align:center;"| 2

Parties

The table below lists the parties represented in the Assembly of the Republic during the 4th legislature (1985–1987) and that also partook in the election:

{| class="wikitable"

! rowspan="2" colspan="3"| Name

! rowspan="2"| Ideology

! rowspan="2"| Political position

! rowspan="2"| Leader

! colspan="2"| 1985 result

! rowspan="2"| Seats at dissolution

! %

! Seats

| style="color:inherit;background:;"|

| style="text-align:center;"| PPD/PSD

| Social Democratic Party

| Centre-right

| Aníbal Cavaco Silva

| style="text-align:center;"| 29.9%

| style="color:inherit;background:;"|

| style="text-align:center;"| PS

| Socialist Party

| Social democracy

| Centre-left

| Vítor Constâncio

| style="text-align:center;"| 20.8%

| style="color:inherit;background:;"|

| style="text-align:center;"| PRD

| Democratic Renewal Party

| Centrism Third Way

| António Ramalho Eanes

| style="text-align:center;"| 17.9%

| style="background:#f00;"|

| style="text-align:center;"| PCP

| Portuguese Communist Party

| Communism Marxism–Leninism

| Far-left

| Álvaro Cunhal

| rowspan="2" style="text-align:center;"|15.5%

| style="color:inherit;background:;"|

| style="text-align:center;"| MDP/CDE

| Portuguese Democratic Movement

| Left-wing nationalism Democratic socialism

| Left-wing

| José Manuel Tengarrinha

| style="color:inherit;background:;"|

| style="text-align:center;"| CDS

| Democratic and Social Centre

| Christian democracy Conservatism

| Adriano Moreira

| style="text-align:center;"| 10.0%

| style="color:inherit;background:;"|

| style="text-align:center;"| Ind.

| Independent

| colspan="5"|Gonçalo Ribeiro Telles Maria Amélia Santos Rui Oliveira e Costa

Seat changes

On 16 November 1985, MP Gonçalo Ribeiro Telles, elected in the Socialist Party list for Porto, left the party and became an Independent, following the agreement he made with the party in order to be elected.
Also on 16 November 1985, MP Maria Amélia Santos, elected in the United People Alliance list for Lisbon, became an Independent representing the Ecologist Party "The Greens".
On 24 June 1986, MP Rui Oliveira e Costa, elected in the Social Democratic Party list for Lisbon, became an Independent after leaving the PSD caucus following disagreements with the party's leadership regarding policy and the 1986 presidential election.

Campaign period

Party slogans

{| class="wikitable" style="font-size:97%; text-align:left;"

! style="text-align:left;" colspan="2"| Party or alliance

! Original slogan

! English translation

! Refs

| style="color:inherit;background:"|

| PSD

| « Portugal não pode parar »

| "Portugal cannot stop"

| width="1" style="color:inherit;background:"|

| PS

| « A alternativa »

| "The alternative"

| style="color:inherit;background:"|

| CDU

| « CDU, É melhor para Portugal »

| "CDU, It's better for Portugal"

| style="color:inherit;background:"|

| PRD

| « Agora Portugal »

| "Now Portugal"

| style="color:inherit;background:"|

| CDS

| « Vote prá maioria »

| "Vote for the majority"

Candidates' debates

No debates between the main parties were held as the PSD leader and Prime Minister, Aníbal Cavaco Silva, refused to take part in any debate.

Opinion polling

The following table shows the opinion polls of voting intention of the Portuguese voters before the election. Included is also the result of the Portuguese general elections in 1985 and 1987 for reference.

{| class="wikitable sortable mw-datatable" style="text-align:center;font-size:95%;line-height:16px;"

|- style="height:42px;"

! style="width:150px;" rowspan="2"| Polling firm/Link

! style="width:145px;" rowspan="2"| Date Released

! class="unsortable" style="width:38px;"|38px|link=Social Democratic Party (Portugal)|PSD

! class="unsortable" style="width:38px;"|PS

! class="unsortable" style="width:35px;"| 30px|link=Democratic Renewal Party (Portugal)|PRD

! class="unsortable" style="width:35px;"|31px|link=Unitary Democratic Coalition|CDU

! class="unsortable" style="width:35px;"|25px|link=CDS – People's Party|CDS

! class="unsortable" style="width:35px;" rowspan="2"|

! class="unsortable" style="width:30px;" rowspan="2"| Lead

! style="color:inherit;background:;"|

! style="color:inherit;background:;|

! style="color:inherit;background:;"|

| colspan="9" style="background:#A0A0A0" |

|- style="background:#EFEFEF;"

| align="center" | 1987 legislative election

| align="center" | 19 Jul 1987

| align="center" style="background:#FFD18D"| 50.2

| align="center" | 22.2

| align="center" | 4.9

| align="center" | 12.1

| align="center" | 4.4

| align="center" | 6.2

| style="background:#FF9900; color:white" | 28.0

| colspan="9" style="background:#A0A0A0" |

|- style="background:#EAFFEA"|

| align="center" | RTP1

| align="center" | 19 Jul 1987

| align="center" style="background:#FFD18D"| 48–50

| align="center" | 21–23

| align="center" | 5–7

| align="center" | 12.5–14.5

| align="center" | 3–5

| align="center" | –

| style="background:#FF9900; color:white" | 27

|- style="background:#EAFFEA"|

| align="center" | Antena1

| align="center" | 19 Jul 1987

| align="center" style="background:#FFD18D"| 45–47

| align="center" | 24–25

| align="center" | –

| style="background:#FF9900; color:white" | 21–22

|- style="background:#EAFFEA"|

| align="center" | Rádio Comercial

| align="center" | 19 Jul 1987

| align="center" style="background:#FFD18D"| 50.1

| align="center" | 21.9

| align="center" | 5.7

| align="center" | 12.1

| align="center" | 4.0

| align="center" | 6.2

| style="background:#FF9900; color:white" | 28.2

| align="center" | Euroexpansão

| align="center" | 17 Jul 1987

| align="center" style="background:#FFD18D"| 41–44

| align="center" | 22–25

| align="center" | 11–14

| align="center" | 13–15

| align="center" | 4–6

| align="center" | –

| style="background:#FF9900; color:white" | 19

| align="center" |Euroexpansão

| align="center" |12 Jun 1987

| align="center" style="background:#FFD18D"|37

| align="center" |28

| align="center" |–

| style="background:#FF9900; color:white" |9

| align="center" |O Semanário

| align="center" |29 Apr 1987

| align="center" style="background:#FFD18D"|38.5

| align="center" |21.7

| align="center" |11.5

| align="center" |12.3

| align="center" |5.6

| align="center" |10.6

| style="background:#FF9900; color:white" |16.8

| align="center" |Unknown

| align="center" |16 Apr 1987

| align="center" style="background:#FFD18D"|37–39

| align="center" |27–29

| align="center" |8

| align="center" |12–13

| align="center" |7

| align="center" |–

| style="background:#FF9900; color:white" |10

| align="center" |Unknown

Background

Fall of the government

Leadership changes and challenges

Democratic Social Center

Socialist Party

Democratic Renewal Party

Electoral system

Parties

Seat changes

Campaign period

Party slogans

Candidates' debates

Opinion polling