BELO HORIZONTE, Brazil —
Brazil’s presidential candidates were gearing
up for their final rallies Saturday in a scramble for votes on the eve of a
white-knuckle election that has deeply polarized Latin America’s largest
economy.
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The 77-year-old
leftist Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, tarnished by graft allegations, remains a
hair’s breadth ahead in the polls after a narrow first-round victory.
But many see the
race against rightwing incumbent Jair Bolsonaro, 67, as too close to call.
The two men came
face to face for the last time Friday night in their final debate, which
featured mutual accusations of lying, corruption and disastrous management.
The run-off
campaign has been a dirty, gloves-off battle for every last vote between two men
adored and hated in almost equal measure.
In Belo
Horizonte, the capital of key state Minas Gerais, Bolsonaro supporters gathered
in the bright green and yellow colors of Brazil that they have adopted to cheer
on the conservative at a motorcycle rally.
‘Whoever gets most
votes, wins’
Bolsonaro is seeking re-election after a first term in which he was
accused of mishandling the pandemic, which left more than 685,000 dead in
Brazil.
His tenure was
marked by vitriolic attacks on his perceived rivals, ranging from the judiciary
to women and foreign leaders.
In campaign ads,
Bolsonaro apologized for his occasional “slightly aggressive” tone, and he has
boasted of reduced crime rates, a drop in unemployment figures, and curbed
inflation.
His conservative
fans love his focus on “God, country, family, and freedom.”
On Saturday,
Brazil’s electoral authorities dispatched electronic ballot boxes across the
country, from cities to remote Indigenous areas in the
Amazon, reported Globo
News.
“We are
absolutely certain that Sunday will be a day of celebration of democracy, a
celebration of popular choice. I am sure that all 156 million Brazilians will
respect the result of the election,” top electoral judge Alexandre de Moraes
told Brazil’s biggest network.
Bolsonaro on
Friday night made one of his clearest pledges yet to respect the election
result if he loses, after a campaign in which he has repeatedly attacked the
voting system as fraudulent and said he would not accept the results of an
“abnormal” vote.
“There isn’t the
slightest doubt: whoever gets the most votes, wins. That’s democracy,” he said.
Lula will make
his final appearance in Sao Paulo, Brazil’s economic powerhouse, later on
Saturday.
The leftist,
Brazil’s president from 2003 to 2010, is seeking a comeback, telling voters
they are choosing between “democracy and barbarism, between peace and war”.
He was the
country’s most popular president when he left office, helping to lift millions
out of poverty with his social welfare programs.
But he then
became mired in a massive corruption scandal and was jailed for 18 months
before his convictions were thrown out last year. The Supreme Court found the
lead judge was biased, but Lula was never exonerated.
The dogfight has
frayed nerves in the country of 215 million people, which is facing pressing
issues, including hunger and economic recovery from the pandemic.
However,
critical policy issues such as the economy, corruption and the stricken Amazon
have taken a backseat to personal attacks.
Fight for undecided voters
Bolsonaro outperformed
pollsters’ predictions in the first-round vote on October 2 to finish just five
points shy of Lula — 48 percent to 43 percent.
Lula now has 53 percent voter support to Bolsonaro’s
47 percent, according to a poll published Thursday by the Datafolha institute,
which will release a final poll Saturday night.
Both candidates have gone all-out to win over the 5 percent
of voters who plan to spoil their ballots, and another two percent that are
“undecided”.
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