Victorious and vindicated, the socialists could now become victims of their success

By Hugo Coelho
6 October 2017
Portugal Portugal
The unambiguous socialist victory in Portugal’s local elections on Sunday showed that Prime Minister António Costa was right to join forces with the far left to oust the pro-austerity conservative forces from government two years ago. But it has also put a strain on the bizarre alliance ahead of fiddly budget discussions.
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In the final days of the campaign for the local elections in Portugal socialist prime minister, António Costa, was obviously reluctant to give it all he’s got.

Costa traveled around the country and stood next to the socialist candidates in all the main cities. But in the communist strongholds of the south, where the party was fighting tooth and nail against the incumbents, he weighed every word.

Behind his inhibited display was the understanding that a large socialist victory would not only be the defeat of the right, but also that of the far-left parties it joined forces with a couple of years ago. Since 2015, Costa’s Socialist party (PS) has formed a minority government supported in parliament with votes from the more radical leftwing parties, the Portuguese Communist party (CPC) and the Left Bloc (BE), which has seen the socialists rise at the expense of its leftist rivals.

In the early hours of Sunday night it became clear that the PS was in for a resounding triumph. The prime minister would have to take the good with the bad.

The socialists won the election in more than half of the 308 councils in the country, their best ever result. Costa’s successor as mayor of Lisbon, Fernando Medina, was reelected with 42% of the vote and the party took control of several councils in densely populated areas, where national factors weigh more in voters’ choices.

The misnamed Social Democrats (SPD), the country’s main rightwing party which leads the opposition, had their worst ever result. The party came third in Lisbon and Porto with a share of the vote just above 10%. The Christian Democrats, also in opposition, had a symbolic victory in Lisbon by polling above their rightwing rival, but nothing more to speak of.

On the left, the communists lost 10 out of 34 councils to the socialists, some of which have been under the party’s control uninterruptedly since the start of the democratic regime in the 1970s. The Left Bloc, the Portuguese equivalent to Syriza and Podemos, made small gains in Lisbon, but failed the objectives it had set for itself in most of the rest of the country.

The results vindicated Costa’s decision two years ago to challenge the EU and start rolling back austerity.

But they also proved that the “contraption” – the nickname given to the bizarre parliamentary alliance of left-wing reformers and radicals – is subject to centripetal forces that affect more conventional political coalitions: the dominant party takes blame when things go badly and the credit when they go well.

Inevitably, the elections are already stirring the political pot. Pedro Passos Coelho, the leader of the opposition, who as prime minister steered the country through the euro crisis, is stepping down. The Social Democrats will elect a new leader early next year.

The implications for the left should take longer to play out in full. Communists and bloquistas can’t easily walk away from their pact, but will seek to extract far greater concessions from the socialist government than before. Their change in tack will make the impending negotiations on the 2018 budget harder to complete.

Costa will be under pressure to cut taxes and increase spending at a much faster pace, but at the same time he must start paying down the country’s debt mountain. A growing economy and falling levels of unemployment will help with this balancing act, but only to an extent.

Restarting automatic promotions in the public sector, which have been suspended since 2011, will be one of the most delicate points of negotiation. Whatever the outcome, the communists and their unions are likely to seize the moment to make a show of strength on the streets.

An unyielding posture on the part of the far left parties will also make it close to impossible for the government to push through structural reforms in the health sector or social security. In short, the “contraption” will carry on with a “faulty wheel,” as the editor of Diario de Noticias, a daily newspaper, pertinently said.

The radicalisation may pave the way for a snap election, which would cut short Costa’s term in office. This could give the socialists a chance to fight for an absolute majority. Failing that, it would force them to rethink their alliances.

Portugal has long grabbed the attention of social scientists investigating the political scars of the financial crisis. In contrast with Greece, Italy and Spain, where austerity brought the downfall of the centre left and the rise of alternative, often extremist, parties, the party system in Portugal remained conspicuously unaffected.

What has changed over the past 10 years or so is the way the five parties represented in parliament have positioned themselves on the political spectrum and more importantly the way they cooperate and challenge each other. This process of transformation isn’t over yet. Sunday’s local elections are going to accelerate it.