Unitarian Democratic Coalition

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Portugal

This article is part of the series: Politics and government of Portugal

Constitution President Aníbal Cavaco Silva Assembly of the Republic Government Prime Minister José Sócrates Council of Ministers Supreme Court of Justice Constitutional Court Council of State Elections: 2006 - 2005 Political Parties Subdivisions Politics of the European Union Foreign relations

Other countries · Atlas  Politics Portal view • talk • edit

The Unitarian Democratic Coalition (Portuguese: Coligação Democrática Unitária or CDU) is an electoral and political coalition between the Portuguese Communist Party (Portuguese: Partido Comunista Português or PCP) and the Ecologist Party "The Greens" (Portuguese: Partido Ecologista "Os Verdes" or PEV). The coalition also integrates the political movement named Democratic Intervention (Portuguese: Intervenção Democrática or ID)

The coalition was formed for the first time in 1987 in order to run to the simultaneous legislative election and European Parliament election that were held in July 19 of that year.

Since the beginning of the coalition, the parties never participated separated in any election. The Communist Party is the major force inside it and gathers the majority of the places in the electoral lists, however, the greens also have an important presence and elected 2 Members of the parliament among the total 14 elected by the coalition in the last legislative election. Each party has its own parliamentary group and counts as a separate party in official issues.

At a local level, the coalition usually presents lists in almost every municipality and both Communists and Green may occupy the first places in the lists. As the Greens have a smaller structure, the offices of the Communist Party are used as offices of the coalition.

Contents 1 Symbol 2 Youth organization 3 Electoral results achieved by CDU 3.1 Results in parliamentary elections 3.2 Results in local elections 3.3 Results in European Parliament elections

[edit] Symbol

The present symbol of CDU shows the PCP's symbol and the PEV's symbol, an hammer and sickle and a sunflower, respectively, with the respective names below. That symbol replaced a former one that featured three hexagons with the inscription: CDU and was often used with a bee. That was sometimes said to mean that CDU worked just like a bee (collectively and every day) and the hexagons were meant to represent the cell-based Leninist organization of the PCP.

[edit] Youth organization

The coalition has a youth wing, called Juventude CDU, that develops political work in youth related subjects, along with youth oriented activities, mainly during the electoral campaigns. The Juventude CDU is mainly composed by members of the youth wings of the parties that compose the CDU, the Portuguese Communist Youth and the Ecolojovem.

[edit] Electoral results achieved by CDU

[edit] Results in parliamentary elections

Results in Parliamentary Elections (year links to election page)
Year	Type of Election	Voting	%	Mandates
1987	Portuguese Parliament	685,109	12.2%	31
1991	Portuguese Parliament	501,840	08.8%	17
1995	Portuguese Parliament	504,007	08.6%	15
1999	Portuguese Parliament	483,716	09.0%	17
2002	Portuguese Parliament	378,640	07.0%	12
2005	Portuguese Parliament	432,009	07.6%	14

(source: Portuguese Electoral Commission)

Note:

• In 1991 the overall number of MPs changed from the original 250 to 230.

[edit] Results in local elections

Results in Local Elections (year links to election page)
Year	Type of Election	Voting	%	Mandates
1989	Local	633,682	12.8%	252
1993	Local	689,928	12.8%	246
1997	Local	643,956	12.0%	236
2001	Local	557,481	10.6%	202
2005	Local	590,496	11.0%	203

(source: Portuguese Electoral Commission)

[edit] Results in European Parliament elections

Results in European Elections (year links to election page)
Year	Type of Election	Voting	%	Mandates
1987	European Parliament	646,640	11.5%	3
1989	European Parliament	594,961	14.4%	4
1994	European Parliament	339,283	11.2%	3
1999	European Parliament	357,575	10.3%	2
2004	European Parliament	309,406	09.1%	2

(source: Portuguese Electoral Commission)

Note:

• In 2004, after the enlargement of the European Union, the number of MEPs elected by Portugal decreased from the original 25 to 24.