Albufeira’s town hall flag is at half-mast today after the city’s mayor, Carlos Eduardo Silva e Sousa, suffered a heart attack and died at his home on Thursday evening - he was 60-years-old.The mayor had joined the region’s other mayors yesterday afternoon to lend his considerable support to the anti-oil drilling meeting and resulting declaration (HERE) that was signed in Loulé. Later, at around 10pm, he was taken ill at his home.
Emergency medical staff rushed to his aid but Carlos Silva e Sousa was declared dead at around midnight.
Silva e Sousa - lawyer, farmer, gastronome and oenophile - was in his second term as Social Democratic Party mayor of Albufeira, using much of the experience gained as an MP in the national assembly between 2011 and 2015.
Silva e Sousa enjoyed a variety of public roles, including representing Lithuania as Consul, and São Tomé e Príncipe as Vice-consul. He was married with two children.
Cheery and hard-working, Silva e Sousa steered the region’s largest council with good sense and fiscal discipline after a long period of poorly controlled expenditure and slack management. The results were impressive and a legacy to his enthusiasm and wide-ranging abilities.
A council statement announced three days of mourning from February 23 and the municipality’s flag is at half mast as a way of "honouring the loss of a great man," noting also “this moment of pain for his family, for all the employees of the municipality and for the wider community of the Algarve and Albufeira.”
