LISBON听–听Thousands are expected to take to the streets to celebrate the 50th anniversary on Thursday of Portugal’s “Carnation Revolution” that toppled the longest fascist dictatorship in Europe and ushered in democracy.
Antonio Oliveira Salazar ruled Portugal from 1932 to 1968, but the regime lasted for a further six years under successor Marcelo Caetano, only聽crumbling聽on April 25, 1974.
The almost bloodless revolution was conducted by a group of junior army officers who wanted democracy and to put an end to long-running wars against independence movements in the African colonies of Angola, Mozambique and Guinea-Bissau.
They regarded those wars, which were聽killing thousands of young Portuguese conscripts, as unjust and unwinnable.
The military coup by the “”听group touched off聽rapid decolonization, ending more than five centuries聽辞蹿听Portuguese empire in聽Africa.
Lisbon University political scientist Antonio Costa Pinto said聽that while most Portuguese support democracy and are proud of the April 25 revolution, there would be “an elephant in the room” at this year’s celebrations with the recent surge in support for the聽populist, anti-immigration Chega party.
“Chega attracts those who have a revisionist view of history with the idea that colonialism and the empire were not bad, and that the glorious Portuguese past and its symbols should be valued,” Costa Pinto said.
A study published on Friday by Lisbon’s Institute of Social Sciences ICS and research university ISCTE found that 23% of respondents聽felt that聽if current political leaders followed the “ideals” of Salazar, Portugal might “regain its greatness”.
Chega makes frequent public use of Salazar’s motto “God, patriotism and family”, to which the party聽丑补蝉听added “work”.
Chega leader Andre Ventura has denied that he or his party is fascist, despite being anti-establishment and wanting to change Portugal’s constitution.
“I’m not a fascist, I was born after fascism…We never hide that we don’t like this system, this Constitution. But that doesn’t mean we don’t like democracy,” he said in 2021.
Founded in 2019, Chega is the third largest party in the European Union member state, having quadrupled its cohort of lawmakers to 50 in聽.
Chega has capitalized on the unleashed by steadily rising rents as well as low wages, sagging health care and cases of alleged corruption involving the mainstream parties in Western Europe’s poorest country. – Reuters
