New president of the Assembly of the Republic is elected today. Is it true that no candidate has ever failed?

The 230 deputies elected in the elections on March 10th have already presented themselves to the Assembly of the Republic this morning and will meet again at 3pm to choose Augusto Santos Silva’s successor as president of the Assembly. The most likely name is the one proposed by the PSD bench, José Pedro Aguiar-Branco, who will have the support of André Ventura’s party, which with this agreement manages to elect the vice-president of the Assembly of the Republic.

By the way, we asked if there was any case in which the name proposed for the presidency of the AR was not accepted by the deputies.

The Polygraph already carried out this exercise in February 2022 and the truth is that the rejection of a candidate for President of the Assembly of the Republic and subsequent reopening of the process It’s not unheard of. This is because, in accordance with Article 13 (Election of the President of the Assembly of the Republic) of the Regulations of the Assembly of the Republic (RAP), “is elected president of the Assembly of the Republic the candidate who obtains the absolute majority of votes of deputies currently in office”, that is, at least 116 votes.

It turns out that, at the opening of the XII Legislature, in the plenary meeting on June 20, 2011, the candidate proposed by the PSD, deputy Fernando Nobredid not get “the absolute majority of votes of deputies currently in office.” Therefore, “a second suffragefor which the same candidate ran, who failed to obtain the necessary majority again“.

Having said that, “in accordance with the provisions of paragraph 6 of Article 13 of the Rules of Procedure of the Assembly of the Republic, the president [em funções, Guilherme Silva, do PSD] declared the process reopened election of the President of the Assembly of the Republic for the XII Legislature and called a plenary meeting for the following day for that purpose”.

On June 20, 2011, on the first attempt, a total of 228 voting deputies registered 106 votes in favor, 101 blank votes and 21 invalid votes. In other words, the candidate Fernando Nobre was 10 votes away the desired absolute majority, failing to be elected. At the same plenary meeting, on the second attempt, there were 105 votes in favor, 101 blank votes and 22 invalid votes. The distance to an absolute majority even increased to 11 votes and, once again, Nobre failed the election.

It was up to Miguel Macedo, PSD deputy, will then take the floor. “Deputy Fernando Nobre, who I want to congratulate here, was guest, in terms that are public, to present his candidacy for president of the Assembly of the Republic. The PSD honors its word. We understood and understood that the candidacy of deputy Fernando Nobre would translate a different form of Parliament’s relationship with civil societyand would not fail to contribute to the prestige of democratic institutions”, he stated.

“We respecthowever, fully, the democratic will of this Parliament and we will assume, consequently, the responsibility that belongs to the party with the greatest expression in this Chamber the responsibility of submitting a new application the president of the Assembly of the Republic”, informed Macedo. “I want, however, on this occasion, to publicly express to Mr Fernando Nobre, in a very clear way, that we register the dignity how this process was conducted. And we want to tell you that you have just given this Parliament, due to the dignity of your conduct in this process, a first great service to democracy. Thank you very much, Doctor Fernando Nobre.”

At the plenary meeting the following day, the PSD presented a new candidate, Assuncao Esteveswho would be elected in the first vote with 186 votes in favor.

As for Nobre, a few days later he resigned as deputy and left the Assembly of the Republic. The former candidate for the Presidency of the Republic (in January 2011, ranked in third position, with 594,068 votes) had been elected deputy as head of the PSD list (as an independent) in the Lisbon circle.