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Majestic mountains, sparkling lakes and charming villages; Linz is a perfect blend of nature, culture and adventure. We are here for the final day of this exciting event, and it's the heavyweights' turn to shine.
Local stars Aaron Fara and Michaela Polleres were busy around the arena, meeting the fans for signatures and photo opportunities before the final block.
On the tatami, Ivan Felipe SILVA MORALES of Cuba scored two waza-aris in quick succession to take the title in the -90kg category with Spain’s Tristani MOSAKHLISHVILI having to settle for silver. An amazing moment for the Cuban.
IJF Refereeing Supe rvisor, Manuel CORTES awarded the medals.
“Yes, it’s a good feeling," said Silva Morales. "The boys in the crowd are waiting for me. One sign, one picture and it’s amazing. It's amazing. I won a medal and take all these pictures of this feeling with the public”.
In the -78kg, Anna Monta OLEK defeated Yuliia KURCHENKO with a waza-ari in Golden Score to take her second gold medal of 2024! What a start to the year for the young German athlete!
Cathy FLEURY, IJF Refereeing Supervisor was on hand to award the medals.
“It feels a little bit like home," said Anna Monta Olek. "I think the crowd is amazing because already in the beginning like in the preliminaries there was already a lot of people and there was cheering and it’s very, very nice to fight here”.
At -100kg double world champion Jorge FONSECA faced off against Leonardo GONCALVES. The Brazilian scored a well timed waza-ari in golden score to take his second gold in Austria! Defending the title he won here in Linz last year.
Awarding the medals was IJF Head Referee Director, Armen BAGDASAROV.
In the +78kg Beatriz SOUZA took home the gold after this impressive ippon! Her first Grand Prix gold medal!
IJF Refereeing Supervisor, Giuseppe MADDALONI awarded the medals
In the +100kg there was a battle between two giants - 2022 World Champion Andy GRANDA and two-time World and Olympic Champion Lukas KRPALEK. Krpalek forced Granda into submission, and the gold medal was his! A passionate celebration from the Czech judoka and a lovely moment with his travelling fans.
Awarding the medals was IJF Head Sport Director Vladimir BARTA
Creating great moments with their fans, the heavyweight Austrian judoka lit up the Tips Arena with some amazing judo, the highlight being Laurin BOEHLER’s bronze medal win with a fantastic ippon! Thank you for joining us here in Linz!
What a day it has been here in beautiful Linz! We have witnessed some incredible judo from the heavyweights. Thank you for joining us!
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"The final result will probably not be known today," the outgoing prime minister António Costa said late on Sunday evening.
With 98.94% of the votes counted at 0050CET on Monday the results were:
The centre-right Democratic Alliance, a grouping led by the Social Democratic Party, is on 28.67%.
The centre-left Socialist Party is in second place with 28.66%.
The far-right, Chega (Enough) party is third with 18.05%.
First reactions from leading politicians
"Chega could reach more than 20 percent of the votes tonight. It's an absolutely historic result", André Ventura, the leader of the far-right party said. "The Portuguese clearly said they want a two-party government: Chega and the Democratic Alliance," he added.
First exit poll at 2110 CET:
Earlier in the evening a widely regarded exit poll by the Catholic University/ RTP had put the centre-right ahead, and the far-right Chega party at 14%-17% of the vote.
The poll predicted 29-33% of the vote for the centre-right Democratic Alliance, a grouping led by the Social Democratic Party. The centre-left Socialist Party gathered 25-29%, the poll indicated.
Populist party Chega (Enough) may have got 14-17% in third place, it suggested, up from 7% at the last election in 2022, in a drift to the political right witnessed elsewhere in the European Union.
The poll by Portugal’s Catholic University was published by public broadcaster RTP and in previous elections has proved largely accurate.
The Centre for Studies and Opinion Polls (Cesop) at the university earlier estimated turnout at between 62 and 68 percent. In comparison, in the 2022 general election, it was 51.46 percent.
A US based analyst suggested that this could help the far-right Chega party.
The election at a glance
A slew of recent corruption scandals has tarnished the two parties that have alternated in power for decades — the centre-left Socialist Party and the centre-right Social Democratic Party, which is running with two small allies in a coalition it calls Democratic Alliance. Those traditional parties are still expected to collect most of the votes.
Public frustration with politics-as-usual had already been percolating before the outcries over graft. Low wages and a high cost of living — worsened last year by surges in inflation and interest rates — coupled with a housing crisis and failings in public health care contributed to the disgruntlement.
The election is taking place because Socialist leader António Costa resigned in November after eight years as prime minister amid a corruption investigation involving his chief of staff. Costa hasn’t been accused of any crime.
The Social Democrats, too, were embarrassed just before the campaign by a graft scandal that brought the resignation of two prominent party officials.
Voting began at 8 a.m. (0800 GMT) and most ballot results were expected within hours of polling stations closing at 8 p.m. (2000 GMT).
The far-right factor
If the first exit poll is accurate, it means the Populist party Chega (Enough) has gained around seven percent more of the vote in this election - seemingly a bigger gain than any other party.
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That suggests it will be the third most-voted party in a political shift to the right that has already been seen elsewhere in Europe. Spain and France have witnessed similar trends in recent years.
Chega could even end up in the role of kingmaker if a bigger party needs the support of smaller rivals to form a government.
Chega party leader Andre Ventura has cannily plugged into the dissatisfaction and has built a following among young people on social media. Just five years old, Chega collected its first seat in Portugal’s 230-seat Parliament in 2019. That jumped to 12 seats in 2022, and polls suggest it could more than double that number this time.
Ventura says he is prepared to drop some of his party’s most controversial proposals — such as chemical castration for some sex offenders and the introduction of life prison sentences — if that opens the door to his inclusion in a possible governing alliance with other right-of-centre parties.
His insistence on national sovereignty instead of closer European Union integration and his plan to grant police the right to strike are other issues that could thwart his ambitions to enter a government coalition.
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Ventura has had a colourful career. He has gone from a practicing lawyer and university professor specialising in tax law to a boisterous TV soccer pundit, an author of low-brow books and a bombastic orator on the campaign trail.
The president urges people to vote
Portuguese President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, largely a figurehead but whose formal consent is needed for a party to take power, urged people to vote because uncertain times in world affairs threatened the country’s wellbeing.
In a televised address to the nation on Saturday night, Rebelo de Sousa said the unpredictable outcome of elections later this year for the European Parliament and in the United States, as well as the war in Ukraine and conflicts in the Middle East, could bring more economic difficulties.
He said that “it is at grievous times like this that voting becomes more important.”
Will the low standard of living be the decide factor?
Meanwhile, voters have expressed alarm at Portugal’s living standards as financial pressures mount.
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An influx of foreign real estate investors and tourists seeking short-term rentals brought a spike in house prices, especially in big cities such as the capital Lisbon where many locals are being priced out of the market.
The economy feels stuck in a low gear. The Portuguese, who have long been among Western Europe’s lowest earners, received an average monthly wage before tax last year of around 1,500 euros — barely enough to rent a one-bedroom flat in Lisbon. Close to 3 million Portuguese workers earn less than 1,000 euros a month.
The number of people without an assigned family doctor, meantime, rose to 1.7 million last year, the highest number ever and up from 1.4 million in 2022.
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The Netherlands opened the National Holocaust Museum on Sunday with a ceremony presided over by the Dutch king as well as Israeli President Isaac Herzog, whose presence prompted protest because of Israel’s military campaign in Gaza.
The museum in Amsterdam tells the stories of some of the 102,000 Jews who were deported from the Netherlands and murdered in Nazi camps, as well as the history of their structural persecution under German World War II occupation before the deportations began.
The museum “gives a face and a voice to the Jewish victims of persecution in the Netherlands,” the Dutch King Willem-Alexander said in the address at the inaugural ceremony on Sunday. It also “shows us the devastating consequences that antisemitism can have,” he added.
“That is why we must continue to be aware of how things began and how they went from bad to worse,” the king said. Earlier, the king and the Israeli president visited Amsterdam’s famous Portuguese Synagogue.
Increase in antisemitic vandalism at Holocaust sites in Germany
Herzog hailed the Netherlands’s initiative to create a new Holocaust museum that he said was a testament to raising antisemitism around the world.
“At this pivotal moment in time, this institution sends a clear powerful statement,” Herzog said. “Remember! Remember the horrors born of hatred, antisemitism and racism, and never again allow them to flourish.”
Sunday’s ceremony came against a backdrop of Israel’s devastating attacks on Gaza that followed the deadly incursions by Hamas in southern Israel on 7 October.
Thousands of pro-Palestinian protesters gathered amid tightened security at the Waterloo Square in central Amsterdam, near the museum and the synagogue, waving Palestinian flags, chanting “Never again is now,” and demanding an end of Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories and an immediate cease-fire in Gaza.
The protest leaders emphasized they were against Herzog’s presence, not the museum and what it commemorates.