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Brazilian voters polled Sunday in a tense election to choose whether to re-elect far-right President Bolsonaro or bring left-wing former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva back to office.
The tight race gave both candidates a second chance.
Bolsonaro has vowed to cement a drastic shift in the conservative wing of Brazilian politics. Lula pledged to take on more social and environmental responsibility, recalling his growing prosperity as president from 2003 to 2010, when his workers’ party was mired in corruption scandals.
Some 120 million voters are expected to punch their choices into electronic voting machines, which Bolsonaro has criticized without evidence for being prone to fraud, raising concerns that he may not concede defeat, as Ideological allies like former US President Donald Trump.
That has heightened tensions in Brazil’s most polarized election since returning to democracy in 1985, when Lula, a former union leader, rallied against the military dictatorship, which former army captain Bolsonaro fondly invoked.
Several opinion polls showed the race between them tightened in the final week, with Bolsonaro slightly ahead of Lula. Others showed Lula a small but steady advantage.
Bolsonaro outperformed the polls among 11 candidates in the first round of voting on October 2. Pollsters said they recalibrated their approach based on the result, but most analysts still said Sunday’s runoff result could go either way.
Lula’s victory would mark a stunning comeback for the left-wing leader, who was jailed for 19 months in 2018 on bribery charges and the Supreme Court overturned his sentence last year, clearing his quest for a third term in office the road.
Lula has vowed to return to the state-driven economic growth and social policies that helped lift millions out of poverty during the commodity boom when he first took power in Brazil. He has also vowed to fight the destruction of the Amazon rainforest, which is now at its highest level in 15 years, and to make Brazil a leader in global climate negotiations.
Bolsonaro’s second term will put Brazil on a path to free-market reforms and liberalizing environmental protections, while cementing an alliance of right-wing parties and powerful agricultural interests that have funded his campaign.
Post-election concerns
Brazil’s electoral authorities are bracing for a narrow result that could challenge Bolsonaro if he loses.
The president has spent more than a year questioning the reliability of Brazil’s electronic voting system. Although there has been no evidence of fraud since it was implemented in 1996, many Bolsonaro supporters now doubt the credibility of the country’s elections.
A rising wave of political violence this year, with armed confrontations involving prominent Bolsonaro allies sporadically in recent weeks, has heightened fears that a disputed election result could spark unrest.
The Superior Court of Elections (TSE), led by a Supreme Court justice, has developed a security plan to protect its staff and buildings in the event of demonstrations such as the January 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Bolsonaro’s allies will organize a “victory party” in Brasilia’s central square during Sunday’s tally.
The president also asked supporters to stay near polling stations until 5pm (GMT 2000) on Sunday, which critics say could intimidate voters and lead to conflict.
Lula, who was born into poverty and led a union strike against Brazil’s military government before founding the Workers’ Party in the 1980s, called on voters to defend Brazil’s democracy from Bolsonaro’s “neo-fascism.”
Adding to the atmosphere of uncertainty, Bolsonaro pushed the military to publicly support his theory that the voting system is vulnerable to fraud.
The armed forces checked some voting machines during the first round of voting to ensure paper receipts were consistent with digital transmissions, but they did not report the findings.
Retired army generals told Reuters they believed the armed forces would not support any unconstitutional actions by Bolsonaro.
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