Teresa Leal Coelho is a Portuguese politician who was a member of the Assembly of the Republic between 2011 and 2019.

Early life and training

Teresa de Andrade Leal Coelho was born in the then Portuguese colony of

Mozambique Mozambique (), officially the Republic of Mozambique ( pt, Moçambique or , ; ny, Mozambiki; sw, Msumbiji; ts, Muzambhiki), is a country located in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi ...

on 29 March 1961. Her family returned to Portugal when she was five but her father, César Leal Coelho, was a navy officer and he, accompanied by his family, was subsequently posted to

Guinea-Bissau Guinea-Bissau ( ; pt, Guiné-Bissau; ff, italic=no, 𞤘𞤭𞤲𞤫 𞤄𞤭𞤧𞤢𞥄𞤱𞤮, Gine-Bisaawo, script=Adlm; Mandinka: ''Gine-Bisawo''), officially the Republic of Guinea-Bissau ( pt, República da Guiné-Bissau, links=no ) ...

, where she completed her final year of primary education. Her school friend there was Paula Saraiva de Carvalho, daughter of

Otelo Saraiva de Carvalho Otelo Nuno Romão Saraiva de Carvalho, GCL (; 31 August 1936 – 25 July 2021) was a Portuguese military officer. He was the chief strategist of the 1974 Carnation Revolution in Lisbon. After the Revolution, Otelo assumed leadership roles in t ...

, a military officer who would be the chief strategist of the 1974

Carnation Revolution The Carnation Revolution ( pt, Revolução dos Cravos), also known as the 25 April ( pt, 25 de Abril, links=no), was a military coup by left-leaning military officers that overthrew the authoritarian Estado Novo regime on 25 April 1974 in Lisbo ...

Lisbon Lisbon (; pt, Lisboa ) is the capital and largest city of Portugal, with an estimated population of 544,851 within its administrative limits in an area of 100.05 km2. Grande Lisboa, Lisbon's urban area extends beyond the city's administr ...

that overthrew the authoritarian '' Estado Novo'' regime. With her parents still in Guinea-Bissau, Coelho attended the Instituto de Odivelas, a secondary school for the daughters of military officers, in Lisbon. She then studied at the Faculty of Law of the

University of Lisbon The University of Lisbon (ULisboa; pt, Universidade de Lisboa, ) is a public research university in Lisbon, and the largest university in Portugal. It was founded in 2013, from the merger of two previous public universities located in Lisbon, th ...

and at the Free University of Lisbon, from where she obtained a law degree. She has taken courses for a PhD at the Lusíada University, where she has been a lecturer since the late 1980s.

Work

In the early 1980s Coelho worked for the national broadcaster, RTP, among other things being the first woman to work in the sports section. She, herself, was a keen

volleyball Volleyball is a team sport in which two teams of six players are separated by a net. Each team tries to score points by grounding a ball on the other team's court under organized rules. It has been a part of the official program of the Summ ...

player, being a member of the

S.L. Benfica Sport Lisboa e Benfica (), commonly known as Benfica, is a professional association football, football club based in Lisbon, Portugal, that competes in the Primeira Liga, the top flight of Portuguese football league system, Portuguese footba ...

club and also working for the club. She has also worked at the

Belém Cultural Center The Belém Cultural Center ( pt, Centro Cultural de Belém), is a complex of artistic venues located in Belém in the city of Lisbon. It is the largest building with cultural facilities in Portugal, with over of usable space. The centre was ini ...

and on social projects linked to child support. In 1999, Coelho was an international observer for the

East Timor East Timor (), also known as Timor-Leste (), officially the Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste, is an island country in Southeast Asia. It comprises the eastern half of the island of Timor, the exclave of Oecusse on the island's north-weste ...

referendum. Later, she was a researcher for the Portuguese National Defence Institute.

Political career

In the late 1980s, Coelho met Pedro Passos Coelho (no relation), who would go on to be the leader of the Social Democratic Party (PSD) and the prime minister between 2011 and 2015. Together with others, such as Paulo Teixeira Pinto and

Luís Coimbra Luis is a given name. It is the Spanish language, Spanish form of the originally Germanic language, Germanic name or . Other Iberian Romance languages have comparable forms: (with an accent mark on the i) in Portuguese language, Portuguese and ...

, they founded, in 2001, the

think tank A think tank, or policy institute, is a research institute that performs research and advocacy concerning topics such as social policy, political strategy, economics, military, technology, and culture. Most think tanks are non-governmenta ...

''Movimento Pensar Portugal''. In 2011, Coelho was elected to the Assembly of the Republic on the PSD list for the

Porto Porto or Oporto () is the second-largest city in Portugal, the capital of the Porto District, and one of the Iberian Peninsula's major urban areas. Porto city proper, which is the entire municipality of Porto, is small compared to its metropol ...

constituency. She was re-elected in 2015, this time for the Santarém district. Her period in parliament was not without controversy. Problems arose when she argued for greater transparency about parliamentary deputies who were

freemasons Freemasonry or Masonry refers to fraternal organisations that trace their origins to the local guilds of stonemasons that, from the end of the 13th century, regulated the qualifications of stonemasons and their interaction with authorities ...

and when she disagreed with the party's support for a referendum on adoption by same-sex couples. This led to her resignation as a vice-president of the PSD parliamentary group. In September 2013, Coelho was also elected as a councillor for the Lisbon City Council. She was re-elected in 2017. Her time in office has also been marked by controversy and in 2019 the PSD's confidence in her was withdrawn for failing to follow the agreed line of the party. Coelho is married to the diplomat Francisco Pimentel de Mello Ribeiro de Menezes, who has been the Portuguese ambassador to Sweden, Spain, and Germany. They have a son.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Leal Coelho, Teresa 1961 births Living people Members of the Assembly of the Republic (Portugal) Women members of the Assembly of the Republic (Portugal) Social Democratic Party (Portugal) politicians University of Lisbon alumni