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Portugal's opposition wins general elections
Source: Xinhua |
June 6, 2011, Monday
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Online Edition
Online Edition
Portugal's center-right Social Democratic Party won the largest number of parliamentary seats in today's early general elections, defeating caretaker Prime Minister Jose Socrates' Socialist Party.
With 99.93 percent of the votes counted, 38.6 percent went to the PSD, entitling the current opposition party to 105 seats in the 230-seat parliament, showed the latest results from the Interior Ministry.
This outcome allows the PSD to secure a comfortable majority in the parliament with its traditional ally, the rightist CDS party, which won 24 seats.
The current ruling Socialist Party, during whose tenure Portugal became the third euro zone country to seek a bailout following Greece and Ireland, gained 73 seats, 24 less than in the last election.
In his first speech after the election, PSD chief and prime ministerial prospect Pedro Passos Coelho pledged to honor his country's 78-billion-euro (US$110.8-billion-dollar) bailout deal with the European Union and the International Monetary Fund and tried to reassure international investors.
"We want to guarantee the foreign investors that Portugal will not be a burden to those who lent money to our country. We want to regain the trust of the international markets," he said.
"We will... turn difficult times into hope. I will put all my efforts into the job of having a stable government for the next four years that will do everything that is necessary to face our problems," he added.
Socrates, who has been leading a caretaker government since he resigned as prime minister in March after the parliament, rejected his government's austerity measures, has conceded defeat and quit the party leadership.
"The Socialist Party lost this election... I want to give the Socialist Party the space to discuss its future and select a new leadership," he said.
With 99.93 percent of the votes counted, 38.6 percent went to the PSD, entitling the current opposition party to 105 seats in the 230-seat parliament, showed the latest results from the Interior Ministry.
This outcome allows the PSD to secure a comfortable majority in the parliament with its traditional ally, the rightist CDS party, which won 24 seats.
The current ruling Socialist Party, during whose tenure Portugal became the third euro zone country to seek a bailout following Greece and Ireland, gained 73 seats, 24 less than in the last election.
In his first speech after the election, PSD chief and prime ministerial prospect Pedro Passos Coelho pledged to honor his country's 78-billion-euro (US$110.8-billion-dollar) bailout deal with the European Union and the International Monetary Fund and tried to reassure international investors.
"We want to guarantee the foreign investors that Portugal will not be a burden to those who lent money to our country. We want to regain the trust of the international markets," he said.
"We will... turn difficult times into hope. I will put all my efforts into the job of having a stable government for the next four years that will do everything that is necessary to face our problems," he added.
Socrates, who has been leading a caretaker government since he resigned as prime minister in March after the parliament, rejected his government's austerity measures, has conceded defeat and quit the party leadership.
"The Socialist Party lost this election... I want to give the Socialist Party the space to discuss its future and select a new leadership," he said.
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