(27 Sep 2009)
1. Wide exterior voting station
2. Wide interior European Union Commission President Jose Barroso waiting to vote
3. Barroso enters to vote
4. Barroso being identified before voting
5. Barroso voting and approaching ballot box
6. Cameraman
7. Barroso putting vote in ballot box
8. SOUNDBITE: (English) Jose Barroso, EU Commission President:
"As always, I come here to vote in the general elections of my country. It is a pleasure to come here to my country and to have the opportunity to vote."
9. Barroso leaving voting station
10. Wide shot, Parque Eduardo VII (Edward VII Park), Lisbon
11. Mid shot, park
12. Lisbon skyline
13. Wide Socialist party candidate Jose Socrates' campaign poster
14. Close shot, Socrates' poster
15. Wide Social Democratic candidate Manuela Ferriera Leite Soc's campaign poster
16. Wide pan Voting Station at Camoes School
17. Close shot, election poster
18. Man voting
19. Vote goes into ballot box
20. Woman voting
21. SOUNDBITE (Portuguese) Vox Pop (no name given)
"I expect more from the next government than the present one because this one ruined the country."
22. SOUNDBITE (Portuguese) Vox Pop (no name given)
"I don't have great expectations, but anyway I have performed my civic duty."
23. Woman voting
24. Vote goes into ballot box
25. Exterior of voting station
STORYLINE:
Portugal voted on Sunday in parliamentary elections that are predicted to keep the Socialist Party in power, despite the highest jobless rate in over 20 years.
The centre-left Socialists have blamed the global meltdown for Portugal's economic crisis and promised big-ticket public works projects to stimulate growth.
Socialist leader and Prime Minister Jose Socrates has also vowed to stick with a modernising social and economic reform programme that has antagonised many, especially trade unions.
The centre-right Social Democratic Party, the main opposition, says public works will saddle future generations with debt. It wants to facilitate more
private enterprise, including through tax breaks.
Recent opinion polls have indicated voters prefer the Socialist option, with 38 percent to 30 percent for the Social Democrats.
Among those voting in the capital Lisbon on Sunday was European Union Commission President Jose Barroso.
Some 9.4 (m) million people were eligible to vote, with complete results expected on Sunday night.
The Portuguese economy contracted 3.7 percent in the second quarter compared with the same period last year.
Some 500-thousand people - just over 9 percent of the work force - are unemployed.
Over his past four years in power Socrates has imposed reforms that have included raising the civil service retirement age from 60 to 65 and
introducing an evaluation system for schoolteachers.
Reforms are needed because Portugal has become one of the European Union's laggards - despite receiving billions in EU development aid since joining the bloc in 1986.
Though it was one of the founding members of the euro currency now used by 16 nations, it has mostly failed to move with the times.
Its productivity and education levels are among western Europe's lowest.
It remains shackled by labour laws introduced by radical leftist governments in the years after the 1974 Carnation Revolution ended a four-decade
dictatorship.
Portugal is western Europe's poorest country, and about a third of workers take home less than 600 euros (880 US dollars) a month after tax, according to the National Statistics Institute.
He has also put hundreds of thousands of computers in schools.
Left Bloc.
three governments in three years.
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