After announcing its lead candidates for ten electoral districts last week, including Paulo Raimundo, the Secretary-General of the Portuguese Communist Party (PCP) for Lisbon, the CDU coalition, which includes the PCP and PEV, has released the remaining 12 primary candidates for the legislative elections on May 18.
Among the recently unveiled names is Paula Santos, the parliamentary leader of the PCP, who will once again be the leading candidate for the CDU in the Setúbal electoral district. This follows her previous leadership in the 2024 and 2022 elections.
The CDU has consistently secured representation in Setúbal since 1976. However, in the last elections, it experienced a historic low with 7.73% of the vote, resulting in the election of only one deputy, Paula Santos.
Since joining parliament in 2009 and becoming the parliamentary leader of the PCP in 2022, Paula Santos has been elected from Setúbal. She appeared on the CDU list as the “number two” candidate in 2009, 2011, 2015, and 2019.
In Évora, traditionally a CDU stronghold until 2022, the coalition is betting on Maria da Graça Nascimento as the “number one” candidate. This marks the first time the 51-year-old teacher will lead a legislative candidate list.
Maria da Graça Nascimento succeeds former deputy Alma Rivera, who led the list in the last elections but did not secure a seat, and MEP João Oliveira, who was the PCP’s parliamentary leader from 2013 to 2022 and consistently elected as Évora’s top candidate since 2009, except for 2022. João Oliveira has been announced as a CDU candidate for the Évora Mayor in upcoming local elections.
In the 22 electoral districts, the only candidate from the Ecologist Party “The Greens” (PEV) is former parliamentary leader José Luís Ferreira, who will lead in Vila Real as he did in 2024.
The PEV lost its parliamentary representation in 2022 when the CDU elected six PCP deputies. In the last elections, José Luís Ferreira was the sole PEV leading candidate presented by the CDU.
According to the CDU’s biography, José Luís Ferreira was a PEV deputy from 2009 to 2022, elected from Lisbon, except in the 2019 elections when he was part of the Setúbal lists. He served as a parliamentary leader from 2019 to 2022. Currently, he is a member of the PEV’s National Council and National Executive Committee, as stated by the CDU.
In Faro, the CDU continues to support Catarina Marques as the lead candidate. She served as the top candidate in both the 2024 and 2022 elections. Marques is a special education teacher, coordinator of Algarve’s trade union group, and a member of the PCP’s Algarve Regional Organization leadership.
In Leiria, the CDU retains João Paulo Delgado, a fisherman and trainer, as the lead candidate, similar to 2024, along with Joaquim Celestino Ribeiro in Viana do Castelo and Fátima Bento in Bragança.
In the Azores, physician António Salgado Almeida will lead the CDU list on São Jorge Island, while factory worker Herlanda Amado will be the candidate in Madeira. The roster also includes Isabel Cristina Tavares in Aveiro, Vítor Reis Silva in Castelo Branco, and Helena Neves in Portalegre.
Last week, the CDU had already announced the lead candidates for Lisbon (Paulo Raimundo), Porto (Alfredo Maia), Beja (Bernardino Soares), Braga (Sandra Cardoso), Coimbra (Fernando Teixeira), Guarda (Catarina Costa), Santarém (Inês Santos), Viseu (Alexandre Hoffman Castela), Europe (Joana Carvalho), and Outside Europe (Ana Oliveira).
