Calls to
postpone presidential election as Storm Leonardo lashes Portugal and Spain
Portugal’s
far-right Chega party has said vote should be delayed as state of calamity
declared in 69 areas
Sam Jones
in Madrid and agencies
Fri 6 Feb
2026 14.32 CET
Heavy
rains and strong winds continued to batter parts of Spain and Portugal on
Friday, causing at least two deaths, forcing the evacuation of more than 7,000
people and prompting calls to postpone the second-round of Portugal’s
presidential election.
Storm
Leonardo, which has lashed the Iberian peninsula this week, has led the
Portuguese government to extend the current state of calamity in 69
municipalities until the middle of February.
The storm
has killed one man in Portugal, while the body of a woman who had been swept
away by a river in the southern Spanish region of Andalucía was found on
Friday. It is the latest in a series of deadly storms to have hit Portugal and
Spain in recent weeks, killing several people.
Authorities
in Andalucía, where more than 7,000 people have been forced to leave their
homes, evacuated residential areas near the Guadalquivir River in Córdoba
overnight, and pedestrian traffic was halted on the city’s Roman bridge.
“We
expect 30mm [of rain],” Andalucía’s regional president, Juan Manuel Moreno,
said on Friday. “In other circumstances that would be little water but right
now it is a lot as the soil is unable to drain and the rivers and reservoirs
are full.”
About
1,500 residents have been ordered to leave their homes in Grazalema, a mountain
village popular with hikers, as water seeped through the walls of houses and
cascaded along steep cobbled streets.
Moreno
told Cadena Ser radio that aquifers in the Grazalema mountains were full and
could provoke landslides owing to pent-up pressure. “This could cause large
holes or ditches. If this happens under a house or street, the result could be
dramatic,” he said.
He added
geologists were assessing the situation in Grazalema to determine when
residents would be able to return to their homes.
During a
visit to a coordination post in Andalucía’s Cádiz province on Friday, the prime
minister, Pedro Sánchez, warned that “complicated days” lay ahead and appealed
for caution and calm. He said that 10,000 emergency personnel had been deployed
to help across the region, adding that the central government was coordinating
the response with the Andalucía regional government.
The heavy
rains are also affecting the olive harvest. Francisco Elvira, who leads the
Coag farmers’ association in Jaén province, put losses so far at €200m (£174m).
Spain’s
state meteorological office, Aemet, issued orange weather alerts on Friday for
coastal areas of the north-western region of Galicia and yellow alerts for
other parts of the northern coast, and for southern and eastern coastal areas,
as well as for the Balearic islands.
Rubén del
Campo, an Aemet spokesperson, said more heavy rain would fall on Saturday.
“Following a slight letup on Friday, Storm Marta will arrive, bringing heavy
rain and very strong winds on Saturday to areas that have already been very
adversely affected by the heavy rains of recent days,” he said.
“Once
Storm Marta moves off on Sunday, further weather fronts will arrive bringing
less intense, but still significant, rainfall to most parts of the peninsula
apart from Mediterranean areas.”
In
Portugal’s second-biggest city, Porto, the River Douro overflowed in the early
hours on Friday, causing minor flooding at riverside cafe terraces. In the
country’s south, large parts of the town of Alcácer do Sal, by the River Sado,
remained semi-submerged for a third day.
The
commander of Portugal’s ANEPC civil protection service, Mario Silvestre, said
six rivers, including the Tagus, were at risk of significant flooding, adding
that Portugal was facing the worst flood threat along the Tagus in nearly three
decades.
The
damage and uncertainty brought by the storm has given rise to calls to postpone
Sunday’s second round of the presidential election.
André
Ventura, the leader of the far-right Chega party, said the vote should be
delayed by a week as the poll was “a matter of equality among all Portuguese”.
But the
national electoral authority said the vote would go ahead as scheduled. “A
state of emergency, weather alerts or overall unfavourable situations are not
in themselves a sufficient reason to postpone voting in a town or region,” it
said.
Scientists
say human-driven climate breakdown is increasing the length, intensity and
frequency of extreme weather events such as the floods and heatwaves that have
struck both countries in recent years.
Reuters,
Associated Press and Agence France-Presse contributed to this report
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