Câmara do Porto Walks the Two Properties Earmarked for Mosques to Public Auction — Campanhã and Centro Histórico Lots Pulled From the CCIP and ACBP Surface-Right Pipeline

The new executive at the Câmara Municipal do Porto announced on Friday that the two municipal properties acquired by the previous administration of Rui Moreira to host the city's first mosques will be placed in public auction (hasta pública). The reversal closes a five-year effort by the city's Islamic and Bangladeshi communities to secure dedicated prayer spaces in Porto, and reopens a politically charged file that the outgoing executive had attempted to neutralise twelve months ago.

The two properties

The first lot is a vacant property on Rua do Pinheiro Grande in the Campanhã parish, originally earmarked for the Centro Cultural Islâmico do Porto (CCIP). The second is a vacant property on Rua da Porta do Sol in the Centro Histórico, originally allocated to the Associação Comunidade do Bangladesh do Porto (ACBP). Both were acquired by the Câmara on the assumption that surface rights would be transferred to the two associations for the construction of mosques. Neither transfer was completed. Both properties have sat vacant since acquisition and will now be sold to the highest bidder under the standard municipal auction protocol.

The new executive's reasoning

The Câmara's Friday communiqué frames the decision as a priority-setting exercise rather than a position on the substance of the religious file. "The construction of mosques in the city of Porto is not a priority," the executive's note reads, arguing that the municipal-property pipeline should be channelled instead toward affordable housing and additional public space. The note does not formally close the door on a future cession but signals the new executive will not deliver on the previous administration's commitments. The political effect is the same: the CCIP and ACBP file is out of the council's planning track and back at the start.

The path that led here

Rui Moreira's executive had advanced the surface-right framework in early 2025 as part of a broader municipal-property programme. The proposal drew immediate opposition from PSD councillors and from a portion of the city's residents' associations, and the file was pulled in May 2025 — Moreira saying the cession decision "will be the next executive's call." The October 2025 local elections returned a different majority, and Friday's announcement is the formal application of that mandate. The CCIP, founded in 2016, runs the city's only registered Muslim prayer congregation; the ACBP serves an estimated 4,000 Bangladeshi residents concentrated in Bonfim and Campanhã.

Where Porto's Muslim community prays now

Porto's Muslim community currently uses temporary spaces — a converted ground-floor unit on Rua de Cedofeita and a borrowed hall in Bonfim — that have been the only operational prayer venues in the city since 2018. Neither is a permanent mosque under the canonical or municipal definition. The CCIP's parallel application for a fully permitted prayer venue under the Decreto-Lei 555/99 urban-licensing track has been moving through Câmara services since 2022 without a final ruling. Friday's announcement does not directly affect that licensing file, but it removes the most material short-term route to a permanent venue.

Comparison with Lisbon

The Mesquita Central de Lisboa on Praça de Espanha has been the only purpose-built mosque in Portugal since its opening in 1985 and serves the country's largest Muslim community. The capital has six other registered prayer venues. Porto, the country's second city with a fast-growing South Asian and North African resident base, has none. The 2021 Censos counted approximately 65,000 self-declared Muslims nationally; the most recent estimate from the Comunidade Islâmica de Lisboa puts the figure at 70,000-90,000, including students and recent arrivals.

What happens next

The two auctions will be opened under the standard municipal procedure with a base price set by independent valuation. The CCIP and ACBP can bid alongside any other interested party but lose the surface-right discount of the cession route. The Comunidade Islâmica de Lisboa is reviewing whether to issue a national statement; the CCIP has not yet publicly responded to the announcement.

Sources: Câmara Municipal do Porto communiqué (9 May 2026); Observador; Público; Notícias ao Minuto.