“We are on track, everything indicates, for IL’s best result ever in a legislative election. This is what we are now confirming in the final moments of the campaign. It is a result we hope for and are convinced will happen,” stated Rui Rocha to journalists during a visit to the Guimarães market in the Braga district.
In the last legislative elections in 2024, IL had already achieved its best result in elections for the Assembly of the Republic, despite maintaining the eight deputies it had secured in 2022: it received 4.94% of the votes.
Although during this campaign he stated his goal was to grow in these elections, Rui Rocha made it clear to journalists today that IL aims to achieve “the best result ever.”
“We are confident. All the indications we have, the opinion studies, the contact with people on the street, tell us that it will happen. Now it is up to the Portuguese to decide if they want the fresh and good solutions that IL offers,” he said.
Urging that “no one stays home and everyone votes for the change that IL proposes” this Sunday, Rui Rocha declared that his party is “a reference compass in a turbulent moment worldwide.”
“It is urgent to make the right, courageous decisions, and therefore, at this moment, in this election, my challenge to the Portuguese is to vote for change, vote for IL’s energy, vote for the ability to bring new solutions to the country,” he remarked.
The IL leader assured that “after the results are determined,” his party would be “as always, beside the Portuguese, with responsibility, focused on the stability and governability of the country.”
“But governability, I insist, for change,” he emphasized.
When asked if, after the results are counted, he would be waiting for a call from the PSD president, Luís Montenegro, Rui Rocha responded, “I will not be waiting for anything.”
“I am waiting for the Portuguese to reinforce their confidence. It is the Portuguese who decide, no one else,” he stated.
Rui Rocha will end the campaign for the legislative elections in Braga, the district where he is originally from and is running as the head of the list after having already been elected in this constituency in 2022 and 2024.
Questioned if this time he intends to bring company to the Assembly of the Republic — in other words, elect IL’s “number two” in this district — Rui Rocha reiterated that his goal is “to grow and have the best result ever, in Braga and the country.”
After, during the market visit, he shredded a cabbage for the caldo verde, and in that process, considering that the left “shredded itself” in the campaign, Rui Rocha told journalists that the left “abandoned bringing proposals for the country, bringing solutions.”
“They ran a campaign of attacks, of fear. And those who resort to fear and attacks to talk to the Portuguese, acknowledge their defeat,” he criticized.
