Local elections were held in Portugal on 11 October 2009. The elections consisted of three separate elections in the 308 Portuguese municipalities, the election for the Municipal Chambers, another election for the Municipal Assembly and a last one for the lower-level Parish Assembly, whose winner is elected parish president. This last was held separately in the more than 4,000 parishes around the country. The elections took place just two weeks after the 2009 legislative election.
The elections resulted in a very close outcome between the Socialist Party and the Social Democratic Party, in which the Social Democrats lost almost 20 municipalities and also lost a considerable number of councilors. The Socialists, despite despite being second in the number of mayors elected, were the party with the largest number of elected councilors, a situation that had not occurred since 1989. The Socialists won also a decisive victory in Lisbon where the incumbent mayor, António Costa, defeated the former mayor and Prime Minister Pedro Santana Lopes by a clear margin, 44 to 39 percent.
The Social Democratic Party (PSD) lost some municipalities to the Socialists, but they did held on to municipalities like Porto, Vila Nova de Gaia, Sintra and Coimbra. The People's Party held on to their sole municipality, Ponte de Lima, continuing its decline in local politics, despite running in several coalitions with the PSD.
On the left, the Democratic Unitarian Coalition, led by the Communist Party, obtained their worst result in history, winning less than 10 percent of the vote and losing 4 municipalities including Beja and Évora. The Left Bloc kept the presidency of its single municipality, Salvaterra de Magos.
Just like in 2005, some independent candidates involved in corruptioninvestigations, having been expelled from their parties, were re-elected again, as was the case of Valentim Loureiro in Gondomar and Isaltino Morais in Oeiras. On the other hand, Fátima Felgueiras, independent candidate in Felgueiras, suffered a surprising defeat to her Social Democratic challenger.
Turnout in these election was the lowest in local election, as only 59 percent of the electorate cast a ballot, although the number of ballots cast in the election was the highest ever in local elections.
Background Electoral system All 308 municipalities are allocated a certain number of councilors to elect corresponding to the number of registered voters in a given municipality. Each party or coalition must present a list of candidates. The winner of the most voted list for the municipal council is automatically elected mayor, similar to first-past-the-post (FPTP). The lists are closed and the seats in each municipality are apportioned according to the D'Hondt method. Unlike in national legislative elections, independent lists are allowed to run.Eleição dos titulares dos órgãos das autarquias locais. Diário da República (in Portuguese.) Retrieved 17 July 2025. Changes to the electoral registration system, approved in 2008, which made registration automatic based on each voter's Identity card, led to a significant increase in the number of registered voters, from 8,8 million in 2005 to 9,4 million in 2009.
By-elections (2005–2009)
During the normal four-year term of local governments, one municipal council by-election was held in the municipality of Lisbon on 15 July 2007, after the then mayor Carmona Rodrigues (PSD) lost the support of his own party, following corruption investigations, and all PSD councillors resigned, prompting the fall of the local administration. The by-election resulted in a victory for the PS, which thus regained control of the Lisbon City Council with approximately 29% of the vote and 6 councillors, while the PSD fell to third place with only 16% of the vote. The ousted mayor, Carmona Rodrigues, came in second place with almost 17%, leading an independent list. Adding to this, twenty-five parishes also held a by-election for parish assemblies.
+City control in by-elections (2005–2009)Date Municipality Population Previous control New control15 July 2007Lisbon564,657Social Democratic Party (PSD)Socialist Party (PS)
Parties
The main political forces involved in the election were:
Left Bloc (BE) CDS – People's Party (CDS–PP) (only in some municipalities)1 Unitary Democratic Coalition (CDU) Socialist Party (PS) Social Democratic Party (PSD) (only in some municipalities)1
1 The PSD and the CDS–PP also formed coalitions in several municipalities with the Earth Party (MPT) and the People's Monarchist Party (PPM).
Opinion polling
Voter turnout The table below shows voter turnout throughout election day.
Turnout Time 12:00 16:00 19:00 2005 2009 ± 2005 2009 ± 2005 2009 ± Total 21.35% 21.23% 0.12 pp 48.00% 45.30% 2.70 pp 60.94% 59.03% 1.91 pp Sources
Results
Municipal Councils National summary of votes and seats
! rowspan="2" colspan=2 style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align=left|Parties ! rowspan="2" style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align=right|Votes ! rowspan="2" style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align=right|% ! rowspan="2" style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align=right|±pp swing ! rowspan="2" style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align=right|Candidacies ! colspan="2" style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align="center"|Councillors ! colspan="2" style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align="center"|Mayors |- style="background-color:#E9E9E9" ! style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align="center"|Total ! style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align="center"|± ! style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align="center"|Total ! style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align="center"|±
|2,084,382||37.67||1.8||307||921||29||132||23
|1,270,137||22.95||5.3||237||666||76||117||21
|539,694||9.75||1.2||300||174||29||28||4 |- |style="width: 10px" bgcolor=#FF9900 align="center" | |align=left|Social Democratic / People's |537,247||9.71||0.5||55||157||21||19||1 |- |style="width: 8px" bgcolor=gray align="center" | |align=left|Independents |225,379||4.07||1.7||49||67||31||7||0
|171,049||3.09||0.0||159||31||1||1||0
|167,101||3.02||0.0||133||9||2||1||0 |- |style="width: 9px" bgcolor=#FF9900 align="center" | |align=left|PSD / CDS–PP / MPT / PPM |164,051||2.96||—||6||22||—||1||— |- |style="width: 9px" bgcolor=#FF9900 align="center" | |align=left|PSD / CDS–PP / PPM |99,838||1.80||0.1||5||17||2||1||0
|style="width: 9px" bgcolor=#FF9900 align="center" | |align=left|PSD / CDS–PP / PPM / MPT |69,584||1.26||0.1||2||9||2||1||0
|14,275||0.26||0.0||17||0||0||0||0
|11,069||0.20||0.2||21||2||2||0||0
|6,946||0.13||0.1||4||1||0.1||0||0
|1,975||0.04||—||1||0||—||0||— |- |style="width: 9px" bgcolor=#FF9900 align="center" | |align=left|PSD / CDS–PP / MPT |1,709||0.03||0.0||1||2||0||0||0
|1,569||0.03||—||5||0||—||0||—
|1,461||0.03||0.0||6||0||0||0||0
|1,202||0.02||0.0||2||0||0||0||0 |- |style="width: 10px" bgcolor=#CC0033 align="center" | |align=left|Labour |732||0.01||—||3||0||—||0||— |- |style="width: 8px" bgcolor=#0093DD align="center" | |align=left|People's / Earth |165||0.00||—||1||0||—||0||— |- |style="width: 8px" bgcolor=#0093DD align="center" | |align=left|People's / People's Monarchist |156||0.00||—||2||0||—||0||— |- |colspan=2 align=left style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|Total valid |width="65" align="right" style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|5,369,721 |width="40" align="right" style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|97.03 |width="40" align="right" style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|1.3 |width="40" align="right" style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|— |width="45" align="right" style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|2,078 |width="45" align="right" style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|32 |width="45" align="right" style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|308 |width="45" align="right" style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|0 |- |colspan=2|Blank ballots |94,983||1.72||0.9||colspan=6 rowspan=4| |- |colspan=2|Invalid ballots |69,120||1.25||0.5 |- |colspan=2 align=left style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|Total |width="65" align="right" style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|5,533,824 |width="40" align="right" style="background-color:#E9E9E9"|100.00 |width="40" align="right" style="background-color:#E9E9E9"| |- |colspan=2|Registered voters/turnout ||9,377,343||59.01||2.0 |- | colspan=11 align=left | Source:
Municipality map
City control The following table lists party control in all district capitals, highlighted in bold, as well as in municipalities above 100,000 inhabitants. Population estimates from the 2001 Census.
Municipality Population Previous control New control Almada 160,825 Unitary Democratic Coalition (CDU) Unitary Democratic Coalition (CDU) Amadora 175,872 Socialist Party (PS) Socialist Party (PS) Aveiro 73,335 PSD / CDS–PP PSD / CDS–PP Barcelos 122,096 Social Democratic Party (PSD) Socialist Party (PS) Beja 35,762 Unitary Democratic Coalition (CDU) Socialist Party (PS) Braga 169,192 Socialist Party (PS) Socialist Party (PS) Bragança 34,750 Social Democratic Party (PSD) Social Democratic Party (PSD) Cascais 170,683 PSD / CDS–PP PSD / CDS–PP Castelo Branco 55,708 Socialist Party (PS) Socialist Party (PS) Coimbra 148,443 PSD / CDS–PP / PPM PSD / CDS–PP / PPM Évora 56,519 Socialist Party (PS) Socialist Party (PS) Faro 58,051 Socialist Party (PS) PSD / CDS–PP / PPM / MPT Funchal 103,961 Social Democratic Party (PSD) Social Democratic Party (PSD) Gondomar 159,096 Independent (IND) Independent (IND) Guarda 43,822 Socialist Party (PS) Socialist Party (PS) Guimarães 159,576 Socialist Party (PS) Socialist Party (PS) Leiria 119,847 Social Democratic Party (PSD) Socialist Party (PS) Lisbon (details) 564,657 Socialist Party (PS) Socialist Party (PS) Loures 199,059 Socialist Party (PS) Socialist Party (PS) Maia 120,111 PSD / CDS–PP PSD / CDS–PP Matosinhos 167,026 Socialist Party (PS) Socialist Party (PS) Odivelas 133,847 Socialist Party (PS) Socialist Party (PS) Oeiras 162,128 Independent (IND) Independent (IND) Ponta Delgada 65,854 Social Democratic Party (PSD) Social Democratic Party (PSD) Portalegre 25,980 Social Democratic Party (PSD) Social Democratic Party (PSD) Porto (details) 263,131 PSD / CDS–PP PSD / CDS–PP Santarém 63,563 Social Democratic Party (PSD) Social Democratic Party (PSD) Santa Maria da Feira 135,964 Social Democratic Party (PSD) Social Democratic Party (PSD) Seixal 150,271 Unitary Democratic Coalition (CDU) Unitary Democratic Coalition (CDU) Setúbal 113,934 Unitary Democratic Coalition (CDU) Unitary Democratic Coalition (CDU) Sintra 363,749 PSD / CDS–PP / PPM / MPT PSD / CDS–PP / PPM / MPT Viana do Castelo 88,631 Socialist Party (PS) Socialist Party (PS) Vila Franca de Xira 122,908 Socialist Party (PS) Socialist Party (PS) Vila Nova de Famalicão 127,567 PSD / CDS–PP PSD / CDS–PP Vila Nova de Gaia 288,749 PSD / CDS–PP PSD / CDS–PP Vila Real 49,957 Social Democratic Party (PSD) Social Democratic Party (PSD) Viseu 93,501 Social Democratic Party (PSD) Social Democratic Party (PSD)
Municipal Assemblies National summary of votes and seats
! rowspan="2" colspan=2 style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align=left|Parties ! rowspan="2" style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align=right|Votes ! rowspan="2" style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align=right|% ! rowspan="2" style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align=right|±pp swing ! rowspan="2" style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align=right|Candidacies ! colspan="2" style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align="center"|Mandates |- style="background-color:#E9E9E9" ! style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align="center"|Total ! style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align="center"|±
|align=right|2,028,681 |align=right|36.67 |align=right|1.0 |align=right|306 |align=right|2,855 |align=right|61
|align=right|1,226,283 |align=right|22.16 |align=right|4.8 |align=right|235 |align=right|2,124 |align=right|292
|align=right|588,011 |align=right|10.63 |align=right|1.1 |align=right|301 |align=right|651 |align=right|71 |- |style="width: 10px" bgcolor=#FF9900 align="center" | |align=left|Social Democratic / People's |align=right|515,145 |align=right|9.31 |align=right|0.9