A record number of 11 candidates in Portugal’s upcoming presidential election kicked off their campaigns on Sunday.
The official two-week campaign period preceding the Jan. 18 election will see the contenders competing to capture voters’ support. However, the broad field makes it unlikely that any candidate will capture more than 50% of the vote, leaving the two top candidates to compete in a runoff ballot on Feb. 8.
Among the frontrunners, according to recent opinion polls, are the candidates from the country’s two main parties that have alternated in power for the past 50 years: Luís Marques Mendes from the center-right Social Democratic Party, currently in government, and António José Seguro of the center-left Socialist Party.
They are expected to face strong challenges from André Ventura, the leader of the Chega party, whose surge in support made it the second largest party in Portugal’s Parliament last year, and Henrique Gouveia e Melo, a retired admiral running as an independent.
