António Soares Carneiro

António Soares Carneiro
OA ComI GCTE
António Soares Carneiro OA ComI GCTE
	Soares Carneiro in 1980
Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces
	In office; 29 March 1989 – 25 January 1994
President	Mário Soares
Prime Minister	Aníbal Cavaco Silva
Preceded by	José Lemos Ferreira
Succeeded by	António Carlos Fuzeta da Ponte
Personal details
Born	25 January 1928; Custóias, Matosinhos, Portugal
Died	28 January 2014 (aged 86); Lisbon, Portugal
Political party	Democratic Alliance (1980)
Alma mater	Portuguese Military Academy
Military service
Allegiance	Portugal
Branch/service	Portuguese Army
Rank	General

António da Silva Osório Braga Soares Carneiro, OA ComI GCTE (25 January 1928 – 28 January 2014),^[1] was a Portuguese military officer. A general in the Portuguese Army, he was the governor of a southern province of Portuguese Angola during the Carnation Revolution, which deposed the Estado Novo on 25 April 1974.

Quick facts Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces, President ...

In the 1980 presidential election, the right-wing Democratic Alliance, a coalition of the Social Democratic Party, the Democratic and Social Centre and the People's Monarchist Party, nominated Soares Carneiro as its candidate. Two of his leading supporters, Prime Minister Francisco Sá Carneiro (no relation) and Defence Minister Adelino Amaro da Costa died in a plane crash while heading for a rally in Porto two days before the election. Most polls suggest that the deaths did not have much influence in the result of the presidential elections since they predicted the re-election of President, General António Ramalho Eanes, who won 56% of the votes, was opposed to Soares Carneiro's 40%.

Soares Carneiro later served as Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces, under the presidency of Mário Soares.

He died in Lisbon.^[2]

Candidate		Votes	%
	António Ramalho Eanes	3,262,520	56.4
	António Soares Carneiro	2,325,481	40.2
	Otelo Saraiva de Carvalho	85,896	1.5
	Carlos Galvão de Melo	48,468	0.8
	António Pires Veloso	45,132	0.8
	António Aires Rodrigues	12,745	0.2
Blank/Invalid ballots		60,090	–
Turnout		5,840,332	84.39
Source: Comissão Nacional de Eleições^[3]

Electoral history