Cotrim de Figueiredo's New Movement, Portugal em Frente, Steps Off the Page With 18,000 Members

Six months after he came within reach of a presidential run-off, João Cotrim de Figueiredo is turning the momentum from that campaign into a formal organisation. The former leader of Iniciativa Liberal (Liberal Initiative, or IL) has confirmed that his new movement, Portugal em Frente (Portugal Forward), is now legally constituted, counts some 18,000 registered members, and will be publicly launched after the summer, at the start of the new political season.

Cotrim, currently a member of the European Parliament and a vice-president of the liberal Renew Europe group, first floated the idea in January, in the aftermath of a presidential bid that saw him finish third with more than 900,000 votes — a result that outran IL's usual electoral weight and drew heavily on centre-right voters. The movement was registered in March as an association under the name “Movimento 2031 — Portugal em Frente,” but it then sat largely dormant. Its emergence now — what Público described as coming “off paper” — marks the shift from a registered shell to an active, staffed organisation.

Cotrim is at pains to stress what the movement is not. “This is not a party,” he has said, describing Portugal em Frente as a civic-political, non-partisan body built to shape public debate rather than contest elections. Its stated purpose is to mobilise citizens around liberal, reformist ideas — framed as freedom, growth and optimism — on the argument that the established parties will not deliver serious reforms, so pressure must come from public opinion instead. He has said he wants it “totally open” to people of all political stripes.

The “international partnerships” the movement has trailed remain, for now, a promise rather than a list. According to its statutes, Portugal em Frente commits to European and international cooperation — exchanging ideas and good practice on governance and economic development with peer institutions abroad — and Público reports that such partnerships are being lined up. But the specific networks or foundations involved have not been named; the movement says they will be revealed in September, alongside the names of its governing board and advisory council.

So far, only two founders are on the record: Cotrim himself and Bernardo Blanco, a former IL member of parliament who ran his presidential campaign. Cotrim says he has attracted figures “of the highest calibre,” including some inactive politicians, but has declined to name them before the autumn presentation. Invitations to sit on the movement's bodies are still being distributed, and he has acknowledged that some may go to people currently within IL.

That overlap is the delicate part. Portugal em Frente is legally independent of IL, yet it occupies much of the same liberal ground, and the party is running its own cycle of civil-society debates — the “Fóruns do Futuro” (Forums of the Future) — beginning in late September. Cotrim, who has said he does not want to “steal the spotlight” from the parties' own returns, insists the two can coexist. The name he has chosen, and the 2031 embedded in the association's legal title, have nonetheless been widely read as scaffolding for a second presidential bid five years from now — a reading he has neither confirmed nor ruled out. It is a distinct venture from the party's more institutional moves, such as its earlier push to audit and privatise the state broadcaster.