Portugal votes in a close presidential contest, with the extreme right ready for a runoff.

LISBON (Reuters) – On Sunday, Portuguese voters lined at voting places to pick a new president, with opinion polls indicating that three contenders, including the head of the far-right Chega party, were practically deadlocked for a berth in a top-two runoff.

In the five decades after Portugal’s fascist dictatorship was deposed, just one presidential election – in 1986 – needed a runoff, demonstrating how divided the political landscape has become with the growth of the far-right and voter dissatisfaction with mainstream parties.

In Portugal, the president is mostly ceremonial, although it does have certain important powers, such as the ability to dissolve parliament, call a snap legislative election, and veto legislation.

Approximately 11 million people are eligible to cast ballots.

Polling stations will shut at 7 p.m. (1900 GMT), with exit polls scheduled for 8 p.m. and results announced throughout the night.

Pitagorica pollsters’ most recent pre-election opinion poll, released on Friday, had Socialist Antonio Jose Seguro at 25.1%, Chega leader Andre Ventura at 23%, and Joao Cotrim de Figueiredo, a member of the European Parliament from the right-wing, pro-business Liberal Initiative party, at 22.3%.

Chega, an anti-establishment, anti-immigrant party created barely seven years ago, became the major opposition party in a parliamentary election last May, winning 22.8% of the votes.

Other polls taken during the last week showed Ventura marginally ahead, but always within the margin of error, and all runoff estimates show him losing owing to his high rejection rate of more than 60% of voters.

In a recent analysis, the Economist Intelligence Unit stated that a Seguro-Ventura runoff “would be more straightforward given his (Ventura’s) limited appeal beyond his core base,” but a confrontation with Cotrim Figueiredo would be more delicately balanced and difficult to forecast.

“While the presidency is largely symbolic, Ventura is the only candidate signalling a more interventionist approach, though EIU sees this as unlikely to translate into victory,” the union stated.

There are eight additional candidates, including Luis Marques Mendes, who is supported by the government center-right Social Democrats, and retired Admiral Henrique Gouveia e Melo, who spearheaded the country’s COVID-19 immunization drive, both with more than 11%.