The road into Albufeira is thronged with billboards. Some, such as the faded one on a roundabout leading to the centre of the southern Portuguese resort city, offer sun-bleached glimpses of enticing real estate, golden beaches and vibrant nightlife. Others that have sprung up before Sunday’s local elections peddle promises of a different kind.
By far the most numerous are those belonging to the far-right Chega party. Its political posters feature one-line grievances about the state of public health, education and housing and tell passing drivers that all these problems will be solved once Chega is in charge.
There is a good chance that disillusioned Albufeirans – in a city that has voted for the centre-right PSD for more than two decades – will help give Chega a historic night on Sunday. After leapfrogging the socialists to take second place in May’s general election, Chega now hopes to leverage local-level frustrations to gain dozens of municipalities across the country and position itself for the same in the next general election.
The Algarve sits at the very centre of the far-right’s strategy. Chega’s leader, André Ventura, a former football pundit and columnist who left the PSD to found the new party just six years ago, has called the region the “party’s stronghold” and the starting point of Portugal’s “conquest” by the far right.
André Ventura campaigning in Sabugal, central Portugal. Photograph: Miguel A Lopes/EPA
A recent poll for the Portuguese daily Diário de Notícias put Ventura’s party in the lead for the national vote for the first time. Its cocktail of populist policies, among them stricter controls on migration and chemical castration for paedophiles, have grabbed the attention of voters who are sick of a series of corruption scandals that have dogged the two main parties over recent years. Some believe Ventura may be on the fast track to becoming prime minister.
“If in two months there’s a new political scandal and new snap elections, Chega would likely win the general elections,” said António Costa Pinto, a political scientist at Lisbon University’s Institute of Social Sciences.
Chega voters in the Algarve argue that the party needs to use Sunday’s elections as a springboard for a nationwide takeover. Daniel Vicente, a 30-year-old barman from Albufeira, said: “I sincerely hope Chega wins. The Algarve is collapsing … Well, Portugal is collapsing.”
Housing prices are Vicente’s biggest concern. The Algarve, which faces the same consequences of overtourism as other parts of Europe, has the second highest housing costs in Portugal after Lisbon. Rental prices in Albufeira have risen by more than 16% in the last year alone.
Vicente, repeating several of Chega’s talking points and misinformation, pointed the finger at the low-wage migrants who had come to the region.
“Migrants who come here have everything going for them,” he said. “They share two-bedroom flats with 10 people. They pay little rent so they have money left. I don’t know what kind of support they receive but they must be receiving some support because they open up their own stores and you wonder how they did it.
“I have to pay €800 (£696) for a flat and for everything else on a little more than the minimum wage [€870 a month]. No one gives me anything, and I don’t have enough money in the bank to ask for a loan to buy a house.”
That resentment was Chega’s breeding ground. The party’s meteoric rise, boosted by three snap elections in the last three years and massively disproportionate media coverage, mostly lies in Ventura’s capacity to tap into people’s unexplored anger and use it to disrupt the political conversation.
Miguel Carvalho, a journalist and author of the book Por Dentro do Chega (Inside Chega), said: “In 2019, Ventura went to places where politicians hadn’t been in years. He listened to people; he was their shoulder to cry on. And he promised he would shout for them whenever he could.
“When he started making these statements, which people were ashamed to make in public, and when the media gave these statements a microphone and made Chega seem much bigger than it was, people started thinking they were also entitled to talk like that. They felt represented and Chega grew.”
He said the party was “based around Ventura and it runs on his intuition. That was why it grew so much, so fast.”
Gone were the days when Ventura had to chase Santiago Abascal, the leader of Spain’s far-right Vox party, or Italy’s Matteo Salvini for a selfie, Carvalho said. “Now he’s the one who is invited. He travels to Spain and Hungary often. Bolsonaro supporters idolise him. Now he is their star.”
The stark contrast between the Algarve’s image of a seaside paradise and the realities of daily life for many of its residents has made it a perfect target for Chega and an ideal laboratory for Portugal’s rapidly shifting politics. Albufeira has a population of 40,000 and attracts about half a million visitors annually.
“Most of the economy is based on low wages, tourism, and migration associated with tourism,” said Costa Pinto. “These issues make people very sensitive to Chega’s message.”
A view of Albufeira and the beach, one of Portugal’s most popular destinations. Photograph: Sohadiszno/Getty Images/iStockphoto
Near the popular Praia da Oura beach, three tuk-tuk drivers waiting for passengers spoke affectionately about how Ventura had been the first politician to care about them.
“Ventura puts the Portuguese people first,” said Filipe Serrão, 50, who prides himself on having been one of the very first Chega activists in Albufeira.
Rodney Sudário, 38, a Brazilian driver who has been in Portugal for 18 years, said he would cast his ballot for Chega. He was not bothered by Ventura’s demonisation of migrants because he thinks the problems lie with those “from non-Christian cultures” – something that his colleague Tiago Filipe, 29, agreed with.
“Chega is not against migrants, only those who don’t want to work,” Filipe said. “All migrants coming from south-east Asia are unqualified. And Muslims only want subsidies. They want to take over Europe – Islamise it.”
Not everyone agrees. A few metres from the tuk-tuks’ parking spot, an Indian man who has been working in Albufeira for 10 years shook his head. He worried that a Chega win would make “everything more difficult” for him and others like him.
“It’s puzzling to me how the Portuguese, who have emigrated everywhere, are against migration now,” he said. “It wasn’t like this before, but Chega talks and talks and promises everything – impossible things. If Ventura wins and ends up kicking all the migrants out, where will he find the people to work at restaurants and in agriculture?” the man said.
For some, however, Sunday can’t come soon enough. “If Chega wins, we’ll take our flags and go in tuk-tuks parading around,” Filipe said. “It’s going to be a party. The Algarve is Chega’s kingdom. The rest of the country will follow.”
