1996 Azorean regional election

The 1996 Azores Regional Election was an election held on 13 October 1996 for the legislative assembly and government of the Portuguese autonomous region of the Azores.
The Socialist Party, under the leadership of Carlos César, was the first party with 45 percent of the votes, in comparison to their direct rivals, the Social Democratic Party who won 41 percent, although both parties were tied in seats with each party winning 24 MPs.
Voter turnout was relatively high with just over 59.17 percent of the electorate casting their ballot on election day.

Electoral system

For the 1996 election, the Azores regional parliament elected 52 members through a proportional system in which the 9 islands elect a number of MPs proportional to the number of registered voters. MPs are allocated by using the D'Hondt method.

Constituency	Total MPs	Registered voters
Corvo	2
Faial	4
Flores	3
Graciosa	3
Pico	4
Santa Maria	3
São Jorge	4
São Miguel	19
Terceira	10
Total	52

Political parties

A total of 6 political parties presented lists of candidates for the regional elections in the Azores, where 191,477 electors could elect 52 deputies to the Legislative Assembly. Of these parties, some of the more prominent:

Democratic Party of the Atlantic.
Democratic Unity Coalition, an alliance of the Greens and Portuguese Communist Party.
People's Democratic Union.
People's Party, an alliance with the People's Monarchist Party.
Socialist Party, leader Carlos César.
Social [Democratic Party (Portugal)|Social Democratic Party], leader Álvaro Dâmaso.

Results

The winner of the election was the Socialist Party which, for the first time received a plurality of the public vote, although they obtained a comparable number of representatives in the Regional Assembly.
After 20 years of successive right-of-centre Social Democratic victories, Carlos Manuel Martins do Vale César became the new president of the Regional Government, succeeding Alberto Romão Madruga da Costa.
At the same time, the Democratic Alliance of the Azores lost its only deputy, while the People's Party elected three deputies. Meanwhile, the Unitary Democratic Coalition, led by the Portuguese Communist Party maintained its one deputy MP by electing one deputy on the island of Flores. The People's Democratic Union did not elect a single deputy.

Summary of votes and seats

! rowspan="2" colspan=2 style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align=left|Parties
! rowspan="2" style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align=right|Votes
! rowspan="2" style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align=right|%
! rowspan="2" style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align=right|±pp swing
! colspan="5" style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align="center"|MPs
! align="center"|1992
! align="center"|1996
! style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align=right|±
! style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align=right|%
! style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align=right|±

Distribution by constituency

Aftermath

Government approval

For the first time since democracy was established, the PSD failed to remain as the most voted party in the Azores and the PS formed a minority government. CDS – People's Party supported, from the outside, the PS minority government. On 22 November 1996, the regional parliament approved the first center-left government in Azorean history: