Madrid, 28 March 2024 (dpa/MIA) - Portugal's parliament elected conservative MP José Pedro Aguiar-Branco as its new president on Wednesday.

The politician from the conservative alliance Democratic Alliance (AD) was voted in by 160 of the 230 members of the parliament in Lisbon, the Assembleia da República said.

Four deputies from other parties were also elected. The election of Aguiar-Branco only became possible after the opposition socialist party PS gave up its resistance to the conservative.

Aguiar-Branco had failed in his first attempt the previous day and only received 88 votes.

The AD had received the most votes in the early parliamentary elections on March 10 and narrowly outperformed the Socialists, who had been in power for eight years, but fell well short of an absolute majority.

The conservative alliance only has 80 seats. President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa nevertheless appointed AD leader Luís Montenegro as prime minister last week. Montenegro plans to present his cabinet on Thursday. The new government is scheduled to officially take office on April 2.

André Ventura's far-right populist Chega (Enough), which Montenegro has branded "xenophobic" and "racist," is the party that made the biggest gains in the election, more than quadrupling its seats - from 12 to over 50.

However, Montenegro has ruled out working with Chega. A coalition between conservatives and socialists is thought impossible in Portugal as they are seen as having insurmountable policy differences.

Photo: Wikipedia