Ferraris
for all and wine on tap: satirical candidate shakes up Portugal’s presidential
election
The
campaign by ‘Candidate Vieira’ mirrors the country’s growing anti-establishment
sentiment
Catarina
Fernandes Martins in Lisbon
Fri 16
Jan 2026 06.31 EST
In
Lisbon’s Campo de Ourique market earlier this week, conversation had turned – a
little inevitably – to Sunday’s presidential election, which will decide who
will take over from the outgoing Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa.
But amid
the usual claims and counter-claims, promises and pledges, one candidate has
been offering voters something a bit more enticing than his competitors.
“Wouldn’t
you like a Ferrari, as he promised?” one fishmonger laughingly asked a
colleague.
But his
colleague would not be swayed by the offer: his vote would go to André Ventura,
the former football commentator who founded and leads the increasingly popular
far-right Chega party.
The man
promising the Portuguese people a Ferrari each if elected is Candidate Vieira,
a fictional character created and played by Manuel João Vieira, a renowned
artist, musician and comedian who is running an official, yet satirical,
campaign.
In an
unusual presidential election that features 11 candidates – and with polls
showing little ground between the top five candidates and no one expected to
win outright in the first round – Vieira’s caricature campaign mirrors the
growing anti-elite and anti-establishment sentiment taking over Portuguese
politics.
Besides
the Ferraris-for-all pledge, Vieira has promised wine running from taps at
every household, the creation of a city called Vieirópolis, where AI would free
people from the need to work, an individual mother figure for everyone to help
combat feelings of loneliness, and a skin-tone homogenisation treatment to
darken and lighten skin tones to solve anti-migration sentiment.
Ventura
is narrowly leading the polls, followed closely by António José Seguro, of the
Socialist party. But the race for a place in the second run remains wide open.
This is the first time in 40 years that Portugal’s presidential election will,
in all likelihood, go to a runoff.
The fact
that the Portuguese president has no legislative powers – despite wielding the
right to dissolve parliament, call snap parliamentary elections, and veto
legislation – doesn’t make Sunday’s results any less consequential.
“These
elections mark the end of a tradition in which the presidency was sought by
strong political figures associated with the regime and the elite,” says
António Costa Pinto, a political scientist at Lisbon University’s Institute of
Social Sciences.
He said
that much became clear when Henrique Gouveia e Melo, a retired admiral who led
Portugal’s vaccination campaign during the Covid pandemic, chose to run as an
independent.
“It was
also highlighted by the fact that some charismatic politicians decided to take
a pass, most likely to avoid being associated with the elites by the far
right,” Costa Pinto said. “As for the Socialist candidate, a more traditional
politician, most people don’t seem enthusiastic about voting for him, and see
it as something they need to do to prevent Ventura from winning.”
Although
polls show more than 60% of voters would reject the far-right leader in a
runoff against any of the other top four contenders, the likelihood of Ventura
securing a place in the second round means he will probably continue to upend
the political system in Portugal.
In last
May’s general election, Chega – which Ventura founded in 2019 – capitalised on
widespread dissatisfaction with Portugal’s mainstream left and right parties to
leapfrog the socialists and become the main opposition party.
“If
Ventura makes it to the runoff and gets 35% of the vote, that will alter the
landscape of rightwing representation in Portugal, because it will mean Chega
can appeal to voters from that spectrum, and not just what we now consider to
be his electoral base,” Costa Pinto said.
At the
Campo de Ourique market, Carlos Elias, a 53-year-old fishmonger, had already
made up his mind to vote for Vieira in the first round.
“Candidate
Vieira is the greatest,” he said. “I’ve known him for years, I’ve watched his
concerts, and I find him funny. If he ended up being elected, he would do the
same as others anyway – he would just stroll around and take selfies with
people.”
Vieira
says he’s unconcerned that some electors compare him to Ventura because both
are seen as the anti-establishment candidates.
“I
understand some think that way since André Ventura has convinced people to
believe he’s fighting against the system,” he said. “That’s not true. He’s part
of the system. He’s pushing some age-old ideas as if they’re new, which gives
some the impetus to vote for him.”
Vieira’s
campaign, run largely on social media, has produced dozens of intentionally
poorly made AI memes and videos containing utopian promises and mocking
traditional TV political ads.
Borrowing
dialect and aesthetics from Portuguese popular imagery, and often employing
crude and vulgar language, Vieira’s posts – most of which have gone viral –
serve to expose the absurd vernacular that has taken over politics.
“I want
to be more absurd than Donald Duck Trump,” he said as he announced his run for
the 2026 presidency. He also put himself forward in 2001, 2006, 2011 and 2016,
but this is the first time he has secured enough support to be on the ballot.
Several
young men approached Vieira as he campaigned in the market on Wednesday, asking
for selfies, congratulating him, and cheering him on.
“I’ll
vote for Candidate Vieira,” said Manuel Gil, an 18-year-old student. “I can’t
see myself voting for any other candidate. I think that the way he ridicules
politics is important to get people to pay attention to all the misinformation
going on. So many young people are voting for Chega, and we’re making an effort
to stop them. Candidate Vieira has been helping us do that.”
With
polls showing the comedian securing 1% of voting intentions, Vieira is narrowly
trailing candidates from the historical Portuguese Communist party and Livre, a
leftwing party represented in the European parliament.
Ludicrous
and doomed as his run is, Vieira insists that his idealistic, unrealistic
pledges have a deep and entirely worthy aim in a political system marred by
apathy, discontent and disillusionment.
“I use
metaphorical language, and I am interested in mixing fantasy with reality,” he
said.
“Fantasy
is a part of life, and Utopia used to be a part of politics, but it disappeared
years ago. I want to mobilise people’s imagination because it’s through
imagination that we create solutions that lead to happiness. These days,
there’s a lot of rubbish.
“If
people want to bet on the absurd, at least they should bet on the absurdity and
surrealism of their dreams and desires. That’s one of the most honest things
out there.”
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