During the 1980 presidential election, Gomes was invited to join the National Commission to Support the Reelection of President Eanes (CNARPE; "Comissão Nacional de Apoio à Reeleição do Presidente Eanes") as a jurist. In 1982, she was chosen to replace José Filipe Moraes Cabral as the diplomatic advisor to President António Ramalho Eanes, and was in the position until the end of his term in 1986, additionally, she acted as the President's personal interpreter when meeting foreign dignitaries. Among the dossiers she at the time came into contact with was the unfinished business of the decolonisation of East Timor (formerly a Portuguese colonial possession, abandoned after the Carnation Revolution, and subsequently invaded by Indonesia), with which she worked with the President's special advisor for East Timor, former Prime Minister Maria de Lourdes Pintasilgo.