Last modified: 2015-09-05 by klaus-michael schneider
Keywords: mdp/cde | prd | ph | ad | pda | pxxi | psn | ph | monarchist | amnesty international | may day |
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Non-national parties are forbidden by the Portuguese constitution and
electoral legislation, that only recently was revised to open up the
possibility of citizen’s lists for local organs.
Jorge Candeias, 05 Mar 2003
There were authonomist/separatist movements in the past, but these
days, with the current status of autonomy, these
movements are practically gone.
Jorge Candeias, 04 Feb 2003
The coalition
PPD-CDS-PPM
was called Democratic Alliance
(AD - Aliança Democrática) won a few elections, and ruled the
country for some years.
Jorge Candeias, 04 Sep 1997
Most of the FLA members regrouped in the P.D.A.,
Partido Democrático do Atlântico, a national party (because of a
constitutional article that prohibits regional parties) that gets nearly all
it’s votes from the Azores (and also a bit from
Madeira too) in a percentage that I don’t think ever
reached 5% in the islands themselves. This party uses a white flag with the
party logo in yellow and blue centered. The logo is too complex to describe
adecuately.
Jorge Candeias, 10 Aug 1999
Política XXI is now one of the members of the
Left Block. I don’t know what’s
the flag of this Política XXI, if there’s one.
Jorge Candeias, 20 May 1999
MDP-CDE got into a deep internal crisis and split in two
movements: one civic movement called Democratic Intervention (that remained
tied with the communists) and the party itself that
later changed the name to Política XXI and is
now one of the members of the Left Bloc.
Jorge Candeias, 05 Sep 1997
The Party of National Solidarity (PSN - Partido da Solidariedade
Nacional) is again a party that arose in the late ’80s - early ’90s. It
was nicknamed ’Party of the Retired’, because their main objective was to
defend the interests of elderly people. In two elections, PSN was able to
elect 1 member of parliament. Their flag was similar to that of
Antigua and Barbuda, with the hoist and fly triangles
in green and the central in blue. In the central triangle there was a
yellow sun and below the sun, ’PSN’ in black. I think they already
desappeared also.
Jorge Candeias, 05 Sep 1997
The Party of the Democratic Renewal (PRD - Partido Renovador
Democrático) is a party that arose in the late ’80s originally to fill
the gap between PS and PCP, but very centered in the personality of the
President at the time (António Ramalho Eanes), our last military and
independent president. In the first elections in which the party
participated, it got more than 20% of the votes and the third
parlamentary group, but soon lost its support, electing less than 10
members of parliament in the next elections and none in the next,
dissolving itself shortly after that. If I recall correctly, they
used a logo-on-a-bedsheet flag in white with a symbol in red and
green in the center and "PRD" below the symbol also in red
and green. The symbol featured stylized scales.
Jorge Candeias, 05 Sep 1997
The People’s Democratic Movement / Electoral Democratic Center
(MDP/CDE, Movimento Democrático Popular / Centro Democrático
Eleitoral) is a party that was formed shortly after the revolution, and
descends from the Electoral Democratic Commission (CDE - Comissão
Democrática Eleitoral), an oposition movement during the
dictatorship, that united all the oposition forces of the time to run to
(better said, to do as much of a campaign that they where authorized to do
in) the very undemocratic elections that took place back then. In the first
elections after the revolution, they where able to elect a small parlamentary
group, and in ulterior elections joined the communists
in a coalition, APU, always electing some members
of parliament. In the early ’90s, they broke the coalition, concurred to
the next elections alone, failed to elect members of parliament and
disappeared. Their flag was a red field with a stylized root (4 root
“branches” that joined in a trunk) in the centre.
Jorge Candeias, 05 Sep 1997
MDP-CDE was not that small — it managed to elect 2 MPs on it’s
own in the very first elections held after the fall of the fascist regime. The
flag was red with a black symbol consisting of a sort of root (a
“trunk” and 4 rays in the lower part of it) within a square with
the sigla below. My father has one such flag. It later got into a
deep internal crisis and split in two movements: one civic movement called
Democratic Intervention (that remained tied with the
communists) and the party itself that later changed
the name to Política XXI and is now one of
the members of the Left Bloc.
Jorge Candeias, 05 Sep 1997
Flag of the Portuguese Section of the Amnesty International,
2nd and 6th photos down, found
on line.
Francisco Santos, 26 May 2003
I came across an interesting story in an article published in the “local” supplement of the newspaper Público on May 2nd 2003, signed by Ângelo Teixeira Marques, with accompanyng black and white photo by Marco Maurício, showing this year’s mast raising (a very tall eucalyptus), already with the flag attached.
The story is as follows: to commemorate Labour Day, a meeting is held at Pousada de Saramagos, a village near Vila Nova de Famalicão, in northern Portugal. This is the initiative of José Magalhães, a retired union man, and takes place since the 70’s, when the attendence was far superior to the numbers seen these days.
The thing has its rituals: in the morning, an adecuate log is found «more or less with the permition of its owner», to quote the article. Then, a meter-deep hole is dug and the log is put there and raised without the help of mechanical means, only with arm-power. The firmness of the mast thus created is important because «if the flag falls, that’s a bad omen for the working class». The flag is red without any symbols, and the whole thing consists also of a few fireworks, the singing of one of the hymns of the anti-fascist revolution of April 25, 1974, Grândola Vila Morena and a lunch.
Still according to the article, there’s some level of controversy surrounding the happening and usually, a few days later, the mast is found taken down by somebody.
Jorge Candeias, 29 Jun 2003