Councilors on opposing lists, historical names taking positions and a lot of political struggle. The Socialist Party (PS) councils go to vote this Saturday, July 6, and in Loulé, Faro and Olhão count shotguns with next year’s Local Elections already on the horizon.
These are the three municipalities in which the electoral act will have more than one list of votes – and in two of the cases (Loulé and Olhão) the fight promises to be more heated, because the current presidents of the municipalities cannot run again.
In Loulé, the municipal executive, led by Vítor Aleixo, is completely divided. Aleixo, who is also president of the council, is once again a candidate for this position and alongside him there are at least two councilors: Carlos Carmo and Marilyn Zacarias.
But one of the main supporters of list A (headed by Vítor Aleixo) is Telmo Pinto, president of the Quarteira Parish Council, identified as one of the names in line to be a candidate for the Chamber in 2025. And also, apparently, the preferred candidate of the current mayor Vítor Aleixo.
However, the municipal race in Loulé, after Aleixo's three terms, promises to be lively among the socialist crowd. This is because there is another candidate list for the council, headed by a… current councilor.
This is Abílio Sousa, former president of the Ameixial Parish Council and member of Vítor Aleixo's executive since 2017. At his side, Abílio has at least one other councilor: Ana Machado, who has long been known to have he was not at Aleixo’s side.
In fact, in October last year, Ana Machado and Abílio were the protagonists of a moment of tension in Vítor Aleixo's executive. Ana Machado left the vice-presidency (claiming that it was “neither personal nor health reasons” that led her to ask to cease these functions) and Abílio Sousa was out of the Chamber.
Abílio Sousa's candidacy also has other strong supporters: Júlio Sousa, municipal director, Jamila Madeira (PS deputy), Heloísa Madeira (former councilor of Aleixo), and Luís Filipe Madeira, father of both, historic name of the PS, former civil governor and president of the Algarve Tourism Region and deputy to the Constituent Assembly.
And there's more: Hugo Nunes, former vice-president of the Chamber of Loulé and current administrator of the company Águas do Algarve, is alongside Abílio Sousa. Hugo Nunes has, moreover, also been highlighted as one of the possible names in line to be a candidate for president of the Chamber.
In Olhão, there is also a dispute between two current councilors of the executive led by António Miguel Pina, who, unlike Vítor Aleixo, is not associated with any list: in his municipality, because in the neighboring one (Faro) it's not quite like that, but here we go.
In the fight for leadership of the Political Commission of the PS of Olhão, there are councilors Ricardo Calé and João Evaristo, each at the head of their list.
Both candidates entered the executive in 2021 and were, at different times, vice-presidents of the Chamber, in the current term – Ricardo Calé first, João Evaristo later.
Ricardo Calé's list B has the independent António Cabrita, current president of the Municipal Assembly of Olhão, as its representative.
João Evaristo has Elsa Parreira, also a councilor at the Chamber, at his side.
Em Faro, the fight also promises to be lively, with two lists to vote on. One of them is headed by Adérito Silva, current president of the PS council. This list will have already canvassed Ana Passos, a former deputy in the Assembly of the Republic, to be the PS candidate for the Chamber of Deputies. Faro, as she announced.
The former deputy to the Assembly of the Republic said that she was “listened to by the local bodies of the PS-Faro, to assess your availability” to be a candidate for the Chamber, survey this which «resulted from the nomination of her name, by activists who, gathered in the General Assembly, considered her with the profile to assume a candidacy for the capital of the District».
«Thus, the council selection process for the candidate has begun and will follow the procedure defined in the PS statutes», he added.
However, our newspaper found out, Ana Passos is not the only name on the list that Adérito Silva's continuation candidacy drew up of potential candidates.
On the side of Tatiana Homem de Gouveia, who heads the other candidate list for the Political Commission of the PS of Faro, the favorite candidate for the Chamber is António Miguel Pina, who despite not having (yet) assumed his candidacy for the municipality, already admitted to Sul Informação who is interested in competing.
Alongside Tatiana, there are some strong names from the PS, in Faro, such as João Botelheiro, former president of the Chamber, who is the candidate's representative.
Ana Passos's position seems to be, moreover, linked to the news that points to the still mayor of Olhão as a socialist candidate for Faro, in 2025, with the former deputy defending that «there are no candidates indicated/predestined from above, as many have been propagandizing».
What is certain is that, even after the municipal elections and even the local elections, a lot of ink will still be spilled, regardless of the results.
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