Francisco Sá Carneiro

Francisco Sá Carneiro (born July 19, 1934, Oporto, Portugal—died December 4, 1980, near Lisbon) was a Portuguese politician who served as prime minister of Portugal (1979–80).

A lawyer by profession, Sá Carneiro was elected to the National Assembly in 1969 but resigned in 1973. After a military coup in April 1974, he founded the Partido Popular Democrático (PPD) and represented it as minister without portfolio in the government of Adélino da Palma Carlos during General António de Spínola’s presidency (May–July 1974). In the 1975 elections for the Constituent Assembly, the PPD emerged as the second strongest party, securing 80 seats. The Socialists won 116 seats and the Communists 30. That distribution was more or less repeated in the elections for the National Assembly held in April 1976. Sá Carneiro changed the name of his party to Partido Social Democrata and in the following general election of December 1979 formed with the Centre Democrats and Monarchists a coalition, the Democratic Alliance. His party won 128 seats in the 250-member Assembly; the Socialists obtained 74 and the Communists 44. Sá Carneiro then became prime minister in a right-wing coalition government, which succeeded a government of technocrats headed by Maria de Lourdes Pintasilgo. During his mandate Sá Carneiro died in a light-plane crash near Lisbon. His death remains controversial. In 2004 a majority of the members of a legislative investigative commission concluded that the plane crash had been caused by sabotage.