Early parliamentary elections were held in East Timor on 12 May 2018 after the National Parliament was dissolved by President Francisco Guterres on 26 January 2018.

[1] The Alliance for Change and Progress (AMP), a coalition of three opposition parties, won an absolute majority of 34 of the 65 seats in Parliament.

[4] In the 2017 parliamentary elections there was no clear winner, with the Fretilin party of Mari Alkatiri holding only one more seat than the National Congress for Timorese Reconstruction led by Xanana Gusmão.

After the Kmanek Haburas Unidade Nasional Timor Oan (KHUNTO) backed out at short notice, Alkatiri formed a minority government with the Democratic Party,[5] which held only 30 of the 65 seats in the National Parliament.

[6] Instead, after talks with representatives of all parties and amidst political deadlock, Guterres dissolved Parliament on 26 January 2018 (Presidential Decree No.

[7][8] The bypassing of the parliamentary majority by President Guterres was judged by commentators and state scholars as an "attack on democracy".

Polling stations were located in Lisbon, Porto, Darwin, Sydney, Melbourne, London, Oxford, Dungannon and Seoul.

[13] The 65 members of the National Parliament were elected from a single nationwide constituency by closed list proportional representation.

Finally, the Comissão Nacional de Eleições announced that it would allow a total of four coalitions to stand for election: AMP, MSD, MDN and FDD.

The list of candidates participating in the election had to be confirmed by the East Timor Supreme Court of Justice on 1 April.

The importance of social networks, such as Facebook, over traditional media continued to increase compared to previous elections, but this led to problems.

The AMP made special reference to the fact that its leaders Xanana Gusmão and Taur Matan Ruak came from the armed resistance in the country, while the Fretilin leaders Alkatiri and José Ramos-Horta spent the Indonesian occupation period (1975-1999) abroad on the "diplomatic front".

The PD campaigned with its late founder Fernando de Araújo, who led the student independence movement in Indonesia (RENETIL), and the MSD with Mário Viegas Carrascalão and Francisco Xavier do Amaral, also deceased.

Two posts on the AMP's Facebook account had warned that Prime Minister Alkatiri was "preparing mechanisms to deal with the early elections" with the CNE and the Technical Secretariat of the Electoral Administration (Portuguese: Secretáriado Técnico de Administração Eleitoral STAE).

The party claims that additional ballot papers were printed "to make Fretilin the winner" and they tried to buy votes with "money and rice".

Fidelis Leite Magalhães, Vice-President of the AMP, said the warnings had certain bases and were intended to avoid abuse and "deliberate mistakes".

[2] According to the provisional official final results after 98% of the votes were counted, the AMP won an absolute majority in parliament with 34 of 65 seats.

[3][39] In Dili, Fretilin made big gains and became the strongest party again in its old strongholds of Baucau, Viqueque and Lautém.

[40] The PD leadership declared on 15 May that it would accept the election result and would pursue constructive opposition[41] Xanana Gusmão declared in a press conference on the same day that the AMP agreed to have the election results checked and countered suspicions of falsification from the ranks of Fretilin.

On 19 May, Alkatiri announced that Fretilin was collecting evidence of "criminal electoral offences" to present to the Tribunal de Recurso, where the election results were being appealed.