LISBON, Portugal—Portugal's main centre-right party, formerly in opposition, won the most seats in Sunday's general election while support for the populist far-right Chega party surged, an exit poll showed.

The centre-right Democratic Alliance (AD) is expected to win 83 to 91 seats in the 230-seat parliament, compared to 69 to 77 seats for the Socialists who have ruled since 2015, the poll for public television RTP showed.

Chega is on track to win 40 to 46 seats, up from just 12, making it a kingmaker in the new parliament.

The AD had campaigned on promises to boost economic growth by cutting taxes, and to improve unreliable public health services and education which has been plagued by strikes by teachers and school workers over pay.

"We really must turn the page," the party’s leader, 51-year-old lawyer Luis Montenegro, told a packed final rally at Lisbon’s bullring on Friday night.

He has steadfastly ruled out any post-election agreement with Chega, but other top AD officials have been more ambiguous.

Chega has said it would demand to be part of a rightist coalition government in exchange for parliamentary support and analysts say a a deal with the anti-establishment party may prove the only way for the AD to govern.

- Immigration concerns -

Like other populist far-right parties in Europe, Chega has tapped into concerns about crime and rising immigration.

With one of Europe's most open immigration regimes, Portugal has seen its foreign-born population double in five years and hit one million last year -- one-tenth of the country's population.

Chega, which means "Enough", calls for stricter controls over immigration. tougher measures to fight corruption and chemical castration for some sex offenders.

After casting his ballot in Lisbon, Chega leader Andre Ventura -- a former trainee priest who went on to become a television football commentator – urged a high turnout, saying the election was important because Portugal was "going through deep demographic and social changes".

Just five years old in 2019, Chega picked up its first seat in parliament,becoming the first far-right party to win representation in the assembly since a military coup in 1974 toppled a decades-long right-wing dictatorship.

Its rise mirrors gains by far-right parties across Europe, where they already govern -- often in coalition -- in countries such as Italy, Hungary and Slovakia, or are steadily gaining, as in France and Germany.

The election was called after Socialist Prime Minister Antonio Costa, 62, unexpectedly resigned in November following an influence-peddling probe that involved a search of his official residence and the arrest of his chief of staff.

Though Costa himself was not accused of any crime, he decided not to run again.

- 'Hoping for a change' -

On his watch unemployment has dropped, the economy expanded by 2.3 percent last year -- one of the fastest rates in the eurozone -- and public finances have improved.

But surveys indicate many voters feel Costa's government squandered the outright majority it won in 2022 by failing to improve public services or to address a housing crisis which has sparked large street protests in what remains one of Western Europe's poorest countries.

"I am sincerely hoping for a change," Mafalda Magalhaes Barros, 68, who works at the culture ministry, told AFP after casting her ballot in central Lisbon. "It has been many years of the same people."

The Socialists' new leader, 46-year-old former infrastructure minister Pedro Nuno Santos, had defended the government's record even as he acknowledged it could have done better in some areas.

He argued the Socialist party was a "safe harbour" and warned the right would have to slash pensions and other social spending to finance its promised tax cuts.