Sousa, Marcelo Rebelo de

(1949- )

   Political leader and administrator, law professor, editor, and writer. A son of Baltazar Rebelo de Sousa, important administrator, governor-general of Mozambique, and cabinet minister during the Estado Novo, Rebelo de Sousa took a law degree at the University of Lisbon Law Faculty. Near the end of the Estado Novo, he was a founding editor of the influential, independent weekly paper Expresso, and years later became director or chief editor. As a member of the Social Democratic Party (PSD) after the Revolution of 25 April 1974, Rebelo de Sousa held a variety of positions from deputy to the Constituent Assembly, which wrote the 1976 Constitution, to ministerial posts. He moved up in the PSD after the retirement of Aníbal Cavaco Silva in 1995 to become leader of that party, the most important political grouping next to the Socialist Party (PS). Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa was an unsuccessful candidate for prime minister in the 1999 elections for the Assembly of the Republic. A noted legal authority and a law academic who publishes frequently, he remained a professor of law at University of Lisbon's Law Faculty and the Catholic University, and was the author of law texts. He has also held various municipal posts from Cascais to Celorico de Basto.