Portugal’s Government Collapses After Confidence Vote (Again)

By Charles Szumski

Portuguese Prime Minister Luís Montenegro’s centre-right government lost a crucial vote of confidence amid a conflict of interest scandal, reigniting a cycle of dysfunction in the country’s poiltics that stretches back years. 

Montenegro’s government collapsed late Tuesday just over a year after his Democratic Alliance took power. President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa is expected to announce a snap election for mid-May.

Scandals

The current political turmoil stemmed from allegations concerning Montenegro’s family business, Spinumviva, a consultancy firm specialising in compliance and personal data protection services.

Investigations revealed that the company continued receiving payments from clients, including the casino group Solverde, even after Montenegro assumed office as prime minister in 2024. 

Montenegro’s transfer of shares in the company to his wife also raised questions about potential conflicts of interest.

The revelations led opposition parties, notably the Socialist Party and the far-right Chega, to announce their intention to vote against the government’s confidence motion.  increasing the likelihood of early elections later this year instead of in March 2028. 

Critics said new elections alone would not solve the underlying culture of corruption that many observers fear has taken hold of Portuguese politics.

“Elections do not replace or dispense with explanations,” Portuguese commentator Pedro Norton wrote on Publico, warning that the scandal would further corrode the health of Portugal’s battered democracy.

Third time’s the charm

With the fall of the Montenegro government, Portugal will have held three general elections in three years.

The first was in January 2022, following the rejection of the Socialist Party (PS) government’s budget in October 2021. The impasse led President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa to dissolve parliament and call early elections.

The PS, then led by Prime Minister António Costa, the current Council president, secured an absolute majority and formed a new government in March of the same year.

In November 2023 however, Costa’s administration was embroiled in a corruption scandal of its own involving his chief of staff, Vítor Escária, and Infrastructure Minister João Galamba.

The investigation, known as Operation Influencer, centred on alleged irregularities in the awarding of contracts for lithium mining, green hydrogen projects, and data centres in the country. Under mounting pressure, Costa resigned, leading to early elections in March 2024.

These elections brought Montenegro’s centre-right Democratic Alliance to power with a minority government. However, his tenure was short-lived.

Far-right boon

The succession of political crises has led to frequent electoral cycles and heightened public disenchantment with traditional political institutions.

According to sociologist António Barreto, quoted by Publico, the repeated political crisis caused two of the most damaging phenomena in the country’s life: abstention from politics and the far-right party Chega.

The instability has created fertile ground for populist movements, notably the far-right party, which has capitalised on the prevailing discontent to expand its influence.

During the last elections, Chega secured 18.1% of the vote, resulting in 50 seats in the 230-member Assembly of the Republic, ranking third after the Socialist party and the centre-right Social Democrats.

Portuguese voters did not respond to calls for a “meaningful vote,” resulting in the “most fragmented parliament ever”, and with Chega being the “big winner” of the last election, according to political experts who then spoke to Euractiv’s partner Lusa.