The early elections in 2022 will be very different in their impact and instability from the parliamentary elections in 2019. First, whoever they are, the leaders of the two largest parties will ask, in contrast to what happened in their last ballot, for an absolute majority. to the country. Whether it is a parliamentary stalemate that has fallen victim to a “ruse” or fear of a post-election political swamp, the PS secretary general and eventual PSD leader will do whatever it takes to appeal for a useful vote. in their parties. Costa because of boredom and incompatibility with the left, and also because of the statements that oblige him to never need a PSD. Rio needs a solid result after three national defeats and depends as little as possible on Chega in parliament. Rangela for his sincere belief that he can win elections and become prime minister.

This is, in fact, the second and main difference between the legislatures that came here from the last ones that the country has gone through: this time the cycle of power can really be reversed. And in the realm of governance, where PS risks facing a surprise identical to the one in Lisbon, not being the most popular, as is the case with party leaders, where everyone but Ventura and Kotrim may face an internal dispute the next day.

This will not be enough even for Antonio Costa, the central pinnacle of Portuguese politics for the past six years. He is considering various scenarios. If he wins the election without an absolute majority, will he be able to sit down again with the left bloc and the PCP? After maintaining this budget? Perhaps. If Jeronimo de Sousa and Catarina Martins left the stage, other personalities would take care of the return, with more freshness and less inconsistency. If the alternative is a right-wing government backed by Chega, neither the blockists nor the communists can afford to allow this.

But if André Ventura grows less than expected, with PSD and CDS benefiting from tougher leaders, Costa will face a less obvious and more awkward situation. On the one hand, he no longer has the strength to turn over the second place; on the other hand, his favorite has a relationship with leftist parties that the prime minister no longer enjoys. Pedro Nuno Santos will come and the “trick” will again be united by ideology, harmony and novelty. The left will regain its breath of power, and the right will receive resistance. There will definitely be a written agreement.

If, on the other hand, BE and PCP are so weakened by the overthrow of PS that their votes will not be enough to support the new left government, there is another scenario that needs to be studied and analyzed, which could create problems for the two largest parties in the political system. : useful voting was so focused on PS and PSD that both were forced to understand each other. Under pressure from European funds, the uncertainty of the pandemic, and Brussels and Belém, fearing a country without stability, socialists and social democrats may find themselves in a strange situation when they sit at the same table after a decade of intense polarization in Portugal. There is nothing impossible in the unpredictability of this trip to the polling stations. With the arrival of the majority, a procession of the Central Bloc may well appear. I don’t know if Costa, after consistently abandoning the SDP and the right after six years of opposition, will be able to deal with this situation. But I know that only two men would smile at him: Rui Rio, who will fulfill his dream in the center, and Andre Ventura, who will lead the opposition in this center.

Reviewer