Opting for the Ramrod

The trip may have seemed as long and arduous as any expedition of Vasco da Gama, but the last leg of Portugal's journey from dictatorship to democracy was smooth sailing. Braving oppressively hot 90DEG weather, some 5 million Portuguese went calmly to the polls last week and, by an overwhelming margin, chose General Antonio Ramalho Eanes (TIME, June 21) as their first democratically elected President in 50 years.

It was a notable victory for law-and-order and a stunning defeat for the Communists. Eanes, the tough, austere army chief of staff who put down a leftist military uprising last November, won 61.5% of the vote, trouncing far-left candidate Otelo Saraiva de Carvalho (16.5%), seriously ailing Premier Jose Pinheiro de Azevedo (14.4%) and the Communist standard-bearer Octavio Pato (7.6%). Although Eanes' victory was less a personal triumph than a vote of confidence in the three non-Communist parties that backed him--the Socialists, Popular Democrats and conservative Center Social Democrats--the general is expected to wield his new authority forcefully.

Inhibiting the Law. Eanes tried to soften his image during the campaign by doffing his trademark dark glasses and even kissing an occasional baby, but at his first press conference as President-elect, he lived up to his reputation as a ramrod disciplinarian. Stressing Portugal's need for "a homogeneous, cohesive and operational government," he warned that "insurrectional activities will no longer be tolerated, no matter which direction they come from." Referring to worker and peasant takeovers of factories and farms in southern Portugal, he accused the instigators of "intimidating the population and inhibiting the law."

Giving an ad hominem edge to his words, Eanes expressed dismay at the unexpected good showing of Saraiva de Carvalho and warned Portugal's self-styled Fidel Castro not to carry his "campaign of agitation" beyond the election. Saraiva de Carvalho, who will soon face trial for his alleged part in the leftist uprising that Eanes put down last fall, preached "people's power" during the campaign and called for the creation of workers' assemblies that would eventually do away with parliamentary democracy. In the Lisbon industrial belt, particularly in big factory towns like Setubal, Saraiva de Carvalho's appeal swayed as many as 40% of the voters.

Minority Government. The task of forming a government will go to Socialist Party Leader Mario Scares, 51, whom Eanes has promised to name Premier. Although the Socialists won only a 35% plurality in the spring parliamentary election, Scares plans to form a minority government rather than create a coalition with either the badly humiliated Communists--whom Eanes emphatically does not want in the government --or the parties to the right. He may be forced, however, to leaven a predominantly Socialist Cabinet with a few independents.

Whatever the makeup of the Cabinet, it will have difficulty upholding Portugal's new constitution, which calls for an advanced form of socialism with worker control of factories, state planning and expropriation of the country's principal means of production. The Popular Democrats have serious reservations about this constitution, and the Center Social Democrats actually voted against it.

Asked how he intended to govern under the constitution that he has sworn to uphold, President-elect Eanes told TIME'S Martha de la Cal last week: "All constitutions should be a plan for a way of life. Ours is just that. Its projects will be carried out as far as possible, but we will have to take into consideration the limitations of each moment and not try to go too quickly." Eanes has no compunction, however, about carrying out what he considers to be his essential mandate. "Never again," he says, "will the law be a dead letter."

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