Outgoing Socialists leader and Prime Minister António Costa congratulated Pedro Nuno Santos on his victory in the elections for the post of PS Secretary General, which took place on Friday and Saturday, and wished him “all the best”.
“At this moment of passing on testimonies, I congratulate our comrade Pedro Nuno Santos, to whom I wish the greatest personal and political happiness,” wrote António Costa, in a message he sent to all members of this party.
In the race to succeed António Costa as Secretary General of the PS, Pedro Nuno Santos, deputy and former Minister of Infrastructure and Housing, had as opponents the Minister of the Interior, José Luís Carneiro, and the Socialist leader Daniel Adrião .
Later, António Costa referred in the same message to the period in which he led the PS.
“I would like to thank all activists from the bottom of my heart for the great honor of having been Secretary General of the PS and for the support they have always given me over the past nine years,” he added.
The PS has approximately 80,000 members, of which approximately 60,000 were entitled to vote in these direct elections because they had been registered for at least six months and had current contributions.
This election process in the PS opened with the resignation of António Costa from his position as Prime Minister on November 7, after it was made public that he was the target of a judicial investigation opened by the Public Prosecutor’s Office at the Supreme Court. from Operation Influencer.
António Costa was first elected general secretary of the PS on November 22, 2014, two months after winning primaries for the party’s candidate for the post of prime minister, open to non-members, which he contested with the then leader Antonio. José Safe, in September this year. He has been Prime Minister since November 26, 2015.
In addition to the new party leader, socialist activists voted to elect 1,400 delegates to the PS National Congress, which will meet between January 5 and 7 at the Lisbon International Fair – in which 1,100 delegates will participate.
On Friday, activists from the Lisbon Urban Area Federation (FAUL) and those from the district federations of Aveiro, Bragança, Castelo Branco, Évora, Guarda, Leiria, Portalegre, Oeste, Setúbal, Viana do Castelo and Vila Real voted.
Today there were elections in the federations of the Algarve, Baixo Alentejo, Braga, Coimbra, Porto, Santarém, Viseu, the Azores and Madeira.
The PS announced that the first official election results will be announced at the national headquarters at 11:30 PM by the president of the Congress Organizing Committee (COC), Pedro do Carmo.
Source: DN
