Portugal ramps up border patrols as Ceuta immigration surge fuels political clash

A large influx of migrants arrived in the Spanish enclave of Ceuta on Thursday, prompting Portugal’s far‑right leader André Ventura of Chega to call for an immediate closure of the border with Spain. Ventura framed the arrivals as a threat of “criminals” and used the episode to press his challenge to the governing coalition led by Prime Minister Luís Montenegro.

Montenegro rejected the call for hysteria, urging calm, measured actions and greater supervision of the frontier. The Portuguese government responded by deploying daily maritime and land patrols along the Algarve coast, with the Maritime Police, Navy, Coast Guard and the National Republican Guard’s Border Control Unit conducting regular checks.

The patrols target a known migration route from Morocco that spans 300‑400 km and can take 40‑50 hours to cross, a path that saw a 38‑person boat land near Vila do Bispo a year ago. The heightened security measures occur amid an internal right‑wing contest between Ventura’s Chega and Montenegro’s centre‑right government, with immigration policy at the centre of the debate.