Eight mayors at the end of their term are running for office in neighboring municipalities

In the case of the CDU (PCP/PEV coalition), two of the four mayors are candidates for municipalities that they have already presided over and in which they have also served at least three consecutive terms.

The mayor of Évora, Carlos Pinto de Sá, is at the end of three consecutive terms in this municipality, the maximum permitted by law, and has announced a 'return to his roots', to once again head the CDU list for the Montemor-o-Novo City Council, which he presided over between 1993 and 2013.

In Montemor, Carlos Pinto de Sá will face as his opponent the current president, the socialist Olímpio Galvão, who is running for a second term, after having taken this municipality from the CDU in 2021.

Vítor Proença can no longer run for re-election in Alcácer do Sal, due to term limits, but he wants to 'return' to a 'house he knows well' in the next local elections and will be the CDU candidate for the Santiago do Cacém Council, which he led between 2001 and 2013.

The current mayor of Santiago do Cacém is Álvaro Beijinha, who is also leaving this municipality, but this time he is a candidate for Sines, whose socialist mayor, Nuno Mascarenhas, cannot run again.

João Português, in his third term in office in the municipality of Cuba, is, in this year's local elections, the head of the CDU list for the neighboring municipality of Ferreira do Alentejo, led by the socialist Luís Pita Ameixa.

Pita Ameixa, elected in 2017 and 2021, is running again for a final term in this Chamber, where he had already been president between 1994 and 2005.

In the Algarve, socialist António Miguel Pina, current mayor of Olhão, is running for the neighboring municipality of Faro, led by social democrat Rogério Bacalhau, who also has to step down.

In Faro, António Miguel Pina will face Cristóvão Norte, the current MP, president of the Algarve Social Democratic district, who is running as a candidate for a coalition led by the PSD.

The mayor of Covilhã, Vítor Pereira, elected by the Socialist Party and serving his third term, is the Socialist candidate for the mayor of Belmonte, a neighboring municipality in the district of Castelo Branco.

Vítor Pereira, president of the Castelo Branco district of the Socialist Party, wants to keep this municipality in Beira Baixa, led by fellow socialist António Rocha, as a socialist party, who is leaving as his third consecutive term comes to an end.

The mayor of Valongo since 2013, José Manuel Ribeiro (PS), is running this year for the Maia City Council, currently led by the social democrat António Silva Tiago, who is running again for a third term.

Mayor of Almeirim since 2013, Pedro Ribeiro, also president of the National Association of Socialist Mayors, is this year a candidate for the Santarém City Council, which is social democratic.

The current mayor of Santarém, João Teixeira Leite (PSD), succeeded Ricardo Gonçalves less than a year ago, who took over as president of the Portuguese Institute of Sport and Youth, and is therefore running for the mayor in elections for the first time.

Some former mayors have announced that they will run again in the October elections for mayor of municipalities they once led, notably Dores Meira, who wants to return to Setúbal, and Luís Filipe Menezes, candidate for Gaia.

Lusa | 08:14 - 26/07/2025

Nearly 90 mayors are leaving these local elections after reaching the limit of three consecutive terms in the same municipality, most of them socialists.

In addition to the 89 mayors who are leaving their respective municipalities in these elections, another 46 who were also at the limit of their terms have already left their posts in the last two years, mainly to occupy positions in the Government, as deputies in the Assembly of the Republic or in Europe and public offices: 28 from the PSD or social-democratic coalitions, 16 from the PS, one CDU and one from Juntos Pelo Povo (JPP).

Of the 89 mayors at the end of their term, 49 are socialists, 21 are social democrats or members of coalitions led by the PSD, 12 are from the CDU, three from the CDS-PP and four are independents.

Portugal has 308 municipalities, most of which elected socialist executives in 2021.

The local elections were scheduled by the Government for October 12th and applications must be submitted by August 18th.

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