Portugal swings right... into more austerity

Unsurprisingly, Portugal entered a new political cycle yesterday. Six years of socialist governments came to an end with the resignation of José Sócrates, inevitable given the scale of the defeat suffered by the PS (Socialist Party). But it’s widely known that this change in the cycle largely stems from a protest vote against José Sócrates. A protest because of the outside aid, the economic crisis and against the failure of a style of governance. In other words, there was a stronger desire to see [the exiting Prime Minister] José Sócrates out of office than to see [the leader of the Social Democrat Party and likely future Prime Minister] Pedro Passos Coelho climb the stairs of São Bento [seat of government].

And this poses a hard challenge to the man who is going to lead the new centre-right majority. Although he won a comfortable victory that will allow a wider margin for bargaining with [the leader of the Popular Party], Paulo Portas, Passos Coelho knows that he has not fully gained the trust of the Portuguese. And he’s going to be tested in the hardest of contexts: that of the execution of the extremely severe programme of the troika.

The political landscape changed. But, as expected, Portugal will awake today from the campaign as though it had just been an interlude between signing the agreement with the troika and the start of the implementation of what is really the government’s programme. We’ve gone back to the nightmare after a few weeks’ break when all we have done is to choose who will execute that programme.

Crisis inspired more indifference than a sense of urgency

And if we are returning to reality, we know that it will only be possible to fulfil such an agreement with the three parties of the troika’s ark on board. Not necessarily in the shape of a government à trois, but definitely in the shape of solid parliamentary accords. There will be countless obstacles to applying the memorandum, from social protest to argument about whether the agreement violates the Constitution or not.

At any rate, the resignation of José Sócrates was a relief for the socialists. The cycle of his governance has run its course and the party now has a chance to renew itself. This is the normal process in a democracy and there’s nothing dramatic about it. There are mistakes for the socialists to ponder, to redefine the role of the party in Portuguese society and reinstate the internal debate that vanished under the leadership of Sócrates. A couple of final words, one for the “antitroika” left, the other for the abstention.

Abstention was higher than in 2009 and is the highest ever. A worrying sign that the crisis inspired more indifference than a sense of urgency. But no less worrying is the fact that the electoral rolls remain completely out of step with reality, and nobody is bothered about this. If they were clean, abstention would be lower and rigour higher. But will this interest anyone?

Background

Left takes a hit

“Full swing to the right," [leads the Jornal de Notícias](http:// http://www.jn.pt/paginainicial/) in summing up the turn taken by Portugal in the general election of June 5. Also on the front page are the pictures of the two winners of the elections, the leader of the Social Democratic Party (PSD) and the future Prime Minister Pedro Passos Coelho, and the leader of the rightist Democratic and Social Centre – Popular Party (CDS-PP), Paulo Portas. The PSD won 39 percent of the vote and 105 seats in the 230-member parliament while the CDS won 24, giving an absolute majority for both parties on the right. The Socialist Party of outgoing Prime Minister José Sócrates, meanwhile, lost 24 seats to the benefit of the PSD, but holds onto 73. The Democratic Unity Coalition (CDU, greens and communist) picked up one seat and now has 16, while the Left Bloc (BE) has dropped from 16 to eight.