This Sunday, the National Council of the Liberal Initiative (IL) approved the party’s candidate lists for the legislative elections. These lists were proposed by the party’s leadership and received 59 votes in favor, six abstentions, and three votes against. Key figures included on the lists are Rui Rocha as the lead candidate for Braga, Mariana Leitão for Lisbon, Carlos Guimarães Pinto for Porto, and deputies Joana Cordeiro and Mário Amorim Lopes for Setúbal and Aveiro, respectively.
Rui Malheiro, who garnered 26.6% at the last National Convention of IL in February compared to Rui Rocha’s 73.4%, expressed his views in a statement to Lusa. He claimed that the lists represent a “surface-level normalization of political cleansing due to opinion differences.”
“There is a lack of unity around the party from what emerged from the last Convention,” Malheiro argued, noting that none of the individuals he presented in his list to the Executive Commission in the last internal elections are in an electable position.
“Instead, one sees individuals either from the party leadership or closely affiliated, or party officials [on the lists], including, for the first time, the secretary-general, who appears in an electable position in place of a young person who was in parliament, Patrícia Gilvaz. It seems a rather illogical exchange,” he criticized.
Malheiro was referring to the fact that in IL’s lists, Miguel Rangel, the current secretary-general of the party, is the “number two” for Porto, replacing Patrícia Gilvaz. Gilvaz was elected to this position as a deputy in 2022 and 2024 and had announced she would not run in these legislative elections as she wished to “embrace new challenges.”
The former challenger of Rui Rocha lamented seeing “several important and valuable party members being sidelined due to this principle of personality cult around the Executive Commission and the president.”
“This is already visible in the [campaign] posters for the legislative elections: they do not present ideas, they simply present the face of the party president,” he criticized.
Malheiro further noted that there are “no candidates in electable positions below 30 years old” on the lists, which he found surprising given that the “target electorate of IL” is precisely this age group, and included several “parachute candidates, who are from one area and are candidates in other districts.”
“In these elections and lists, the party’s local branches were not consulted or involved. The Executive Commission centrally decided all the lists,” he alleged.
Malheiro also criticized the party’s leadership for only submitting a document with the party’s programmatic lines for a vote at the National Council, and not the electoral program.
“In the past, the program was approved and underwent changes at the National Council. Now, there is a programmatic line, and the Executive Commission will make the program as they please. This might lead to some disappointments because no one knows what will be written in the end,” he said, accusing Rui Rocha of overturning “a set of fundamental principles within IL” in preparation for these legislative elections.
When asked about the lists receiving near-unanimous approval at the National Council, Malheiro responded that the composition of the National Council elected at the last Convention creates an “almost complete union with the leadership.”
Despite these criticisms, Malheiro urged those opposing the current leadership not to leave the party, emphasizing that their motivation should not be “a power struggle, but rather to help the party improve continuously.”
“There will be more elections, more politics beyond these elections. Therefore, I believe we should all contribute to IL’s positive outcome,” he stated.
