To hell with the radical!

Monday, 30 March 2026RSS
To hell with the radical!

While coming to terms with Chega, the PSD wants to shift the perception of where the centre lies and convince us that it was others who changed. Everyone has become radical: the PS, Carneiro, the UGT, and Seguro. In 1975, Pinheiro de Azevedo lost patience with the trendy insult of the day and replied: 'To hell with the fascist!' Let no one be conditioned by this artificial attempt to redefine the centre of what is tolerated, which labels the basics of democracy as extremist. Let the right live through the excitement of its own revolutionary process.

Context & Explainers

Chega

Chega ("Enough") is a Portuguese far-right populist party founded in 2019 by André Ventura. It positions itself as an anti-establishment movement against what it calls a "rotten and corrupt system" of PS-PSD dominance. The party surged from 1.3% in 2019 to 22.8% in May 2025, becoming parliament's second-largest force with 60 seats. ​ Chega's core platform emphasizes strict immigration control—ending automatic CPLP residency, deporting non-independent immigrants, implementing job-market quotas, and requiring five-year social security contributions before benefit access. It advocates radical constitutional reform, including reducing parliament to 100 members, abolishing the prime minister position for a presidential system, and dismantling public healthcare. Law-and-order policies include life imprisonment and chemical castration proposals.

The party is defined by inflammatory anti-Romani rhetoric, with Ventura convicted multiple times for discrimination. Chega maintains international alignments with European far-right figures including Marine Le Pen, Santiago Abascal, and Matteo Salvini. Mainstream Portuguese parties, including Prime Minister Luís Montenegro's government, have imposed a cordon sanitaire, refusing coalition with Chega despite its parliamentary strength.

View full article on expresso.pt

RSS source