Unitary Democratic Coalition

The Unitary Democratic Coalition[6] (Portuguese: CDU – Coligação Democrática Unitária, CDU) is an electoral and political coalition between the Portuguese Communist Party (Portuguese: Partido Comunista Português or PCP) and the Ecologist Party "The Greens" (Portuguese: Partido Ecologista "Os Verdes" or PEV). The coalition also integrates the political movement Democratic Intervention (Portuguese: Intervenção Democrática or ID).

Unitary Democratic Coalition Coligação Democrática Unitária
Abbreviation	CDU PCP–PEV
Leader	Paulo Raimundo
Founded	1987
Preceded by	United People Alliance
Headquarters	Rua Soeiro Pereira Gomes 3, 1600-019 Lisboa
Youth wing	Juventude CDU
Membership	49,960 in 2020 (PCP) c. 6,000 in 2007 (PEV)
Ideology	Communism[1][2] Eco-socialism[3] Hard Euroscepticism[4][5]
Political position	Left-wing to far-left
European Parliament group	The Left in the European Parliament – GUE/NGL (PCP) Greens–European Free Alliance (PEV)
Colours	Blue (official)   Red (customary)   Pea green[lower-alpha 1]   Green
Member parties	PCP PEV ID
Assembly of the Republic	6 / 230
European Parliament	2 / 21
Regional Parliaments	1 / 104
Local government (Mayors)	19 / 308
Local government (Parishes)	112 / 3,058
Election symbol
Website
www.cdu.pt
Politics of Portugal Political parties Elections

The coalition was formed for the first time in 1987 in order to run to the simultaneous legislative election and European Parliament election that were held on July 19 of that year.

Since the beginning of the coalition, the member parties have never participated separately in any election. The Communist Party is the major force inside it and has the majority of places in the electoral lists, however, the Greens also have an important presence, for instance, electing 2 members of parliament among the 17 elected by the coalition in the 2015 legislative election. Each party has its own parliamentary group and counts as a separate party in official issues. In the 2022 Portuguese legislative election, the Greens failed to elect any representatives.

At a local level, the coalition usually presents lists in almost every municipality and both Communists and Greens may occupy first place on the lists. As the Greens have a smaller structure, the offices of the Communist Party are used as offices of the coalition.

The coalition supported the minority Socialist Costa Government (2015–2019) with a confidence and supply agreement.