Politics

Far-right Chega almost quadruples seats in Portuguese parliament

Lisbon, Mar 11 (EFE).- Portugal’s far-right Chega party has almost quadrupled the number of seats it had in parliament following Sunday’s election, winning 46 compared to 12 in the 2022 elections.

With 98.98 percent of the votes counted, Chega had 18.02 percent and 46 deputies, making it the third biggest force behind the main center-right coalition Alianza Democratic (AD) and the Socialist Party.

In a speech, Chega leader André Ventura assured that “the two-party system is over” and said his party was ready to help build the next government. However, the AD has long refused to collaborate with the far-right formation.

Ventura also highlighted that his party surpassed 1 million votes in the country for the first time in an election.

“This is a victory that needs to be heard in many places in this country,” Ventura said.

The AD and the Socialist Party were in a technical tie ahead of the final result with 28.67 percent of the votes, although the conservatives have two more seats (77) than the socialists.

Despite the close results, the socialist candidate Pedro Nuno Santos conceded victory to AD, led by Luís Montenegro, who has already warned that he has no intention of aligning with Chega, despite the fact that he does not have the necessary seats (116) to reach an absolute majority if it teams up with Inicitiva Liberal, which is fourth with eight seats. EFE

ssa/tw

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