Portuguese presidential election, 1986

The Portuguese presidential election of 1986 was held on January 26, the second round took place on February 16.

This was closest presidential election ever held in Portugal and was won by the Socialist

Portuguese Socialist Party

The Portuguese Socialist Party was a political party in Portugal.The party was founded in 1875. During its initial phase the party was heavily influenced by Proudhonism, and rejected revolutionary Marxism. The party suffered constant factional struggles...

Mário Soares

Mário Alberto Nobre Lopes Soares, GColTE, GCC, GColL, KE , Portuguese politician, served as Prime Minister of Portugal from 1976 to 1978 and from 1983 to 1985, and subsequently as the 17th President of Portugal from 1986 to 1996.-Family:...

, who initially had no more than 5% at opinion polls.

In first round was easily won by Freitas do Amaral, supported by all the right-wing parties, while Soares defeated the other two left-wing candidates, the former Prime-Minister Maria de Lourdes Pintasilgo - to date the only woman to be a candidate to the Portuguese presidency - and Salgado Zenha

Salgado Zenha

Francisco Salgado Zenha, GCL was a Portuguese left-wing politician and lawyer.As a student at the University of Coimbra, he was elected president of the Academic Association of Coimbra, being dismissed some months after because he refused to participate in a demonstration of support to the Estado...

(supported by outgoing president António Ramalho Eanes

António Ramalho Eanes

António dos Santos Ramalho Eanes, GColTE, GCL, CavA, KE is a Portuguese general and politician who was the 16th President of Portugal from 1976 to 1986.-Background:...

, founder of the short-lived Democratic Renovator Party

Democratic Renovator Party

The Democratic Renewal Party was a Portuguese political party, founded in 1985 with the political support of the until-then-independent President of the Republic, Ramalho Eanes. At the time of its foundation, it was meant to "moralize Portuguese political life" and the party positioned itself in...

, and by the Portuguese Communist Party

Portuguese Communist Party

The Portuguese Communist Party is a major left-wing political party in Portugal. It is a Marxist-Leninist party, and its organization is based upon democratic centralism. The party also considers itself to be patriotic and internationalist....

, whose candidate, Ângelo Veloso, left the race some days before the poll). Both these candidates supported Soares in the second round.

There were also three candidates rejected by the Portuguese Constitutional Court for not complying with the legal requirements, those were:

Carmelinda dos Santos Pereira
Luís Carlos Franco
Álvaro Manuel Nunes

Soares did not achieved the majority of the voting in any district, as the left-wing strongholds in the South of Portugal voted for Zenha due to his support by the Communist Party.

As results for the second round were counted, the urban vote, traditionally more left-wing, overcame the early lead of Freitas do Amaral by less than 140,000 votes, and Soares became president on March 9 of 1986.

To date this was the only time a Portuguese presidential election was taken into a second round.

Results

Summary of the 26 January and 16 Frebruary 1986 Portuguese

Portugal

Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...

presidential

President of Portugal

Portugal has been a republic since 1910, and since that time the head of state has been the president, whose official title is President of the Portuguese Republic ....

election results

Elections in Portugal

Elections in Portugal gives information on election and election results in Portugal.Only the elections since the Carnation Revolution of 1974 are listed here. During the period encompassing the Constitutional Monarchy and the First Republic there were also elections, but only for a limited...

Mário Soares

|align=left|Socialist Party

Socialist Party (Portugal)

The Socialist Party , abbreviated to PS, is a social-democratic political party in Portugal. It was founded on 19 April 1973 in the German city of Bad Münstereifel, by militants from Portuguese Socialist Action ....

|align="right" |1,443,683
|align="right" |25.43
|align="right" |3,010,756
|align="right" |51.18
|-
|style="width: 10px" bgcolor=#0093DD align="center" |
|align=left|Diogo Freitas do Amaral

Diogo Freitas do Amaral

Diogo Pinto de Freitas do Amaral, GCC, GCSE, GCIH , usually referred to as either Freitas do Amaral or informally Freitas, is a Portuguese politician and law professor. He was Minister of Foreign Affairs from 12 March 2005 to 1 July 2006...

|align=left|Democratic and Social Centre, Social Democratic Party

Social Democratic Party (Portugal)

The Social Democratic Party , is a centre-right liberal conservative political party in Portugal. It is commonly known by its initials, PSD; on ballot papers, its initials appear as PPD/PSD, with the first three letters coming from the party's original name, Democratic People's Party...

Portuguese Communist Party

Independent (politician)

In politics, an independent or non-party politician is an individual not affiliated to any political party. Independents may hold a centrist viewpoint between those of major political parties, a viewpoint more extreme than any major party, or they may have a viewpoint based on issues that they do...

Ângelo Veloso

Ângelo Veloso was a Portuguese politician.A member of the Portuguese Communist Party since the days of the Estado Novo dictatorial fascist regime of António de Oliveira Salazar, Veloso was imprisoned in Peniche for political views...

|align=left|Portuguese Communist Party

Portuguese Communist Party

|colspan="2" align="center" |left the race
|-
|colspan="3" align=left style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|Total valid
|width="65" align="right" style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|5,677,525
|width="40" align="right" style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|100.00
|width="65" align="right" style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|5,882,820
|width="40" align="right" style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|100.00
|-
|align=right colspan="3"|Blank ballots
|width="65" align="right" |46,334
|width="40" align="right" |0.81
|width="65" align="right" |33,844
|width="40" align="right" |0.57
|-
|align=right colspan="3" |Invalid ballots
|width="65" align="right"|18,292
|width="40" align="right"|0.32
|width="65" align="right"|20,436
|width="40" align="right"|0.34
|-
|colspan="3" align=left style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|Total (turnout 75.38% and 77.99%)
|width="65" align="right" style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|5,742,151
|width="40" align="right" style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|
|width="65" align="right" style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|5,937,100
|width="40" align="right" style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|
|-
|colspan=7 align=left|Source: Comissão Nacional de Eleições
|}

Results

See also