BRASILIA (Portal) – Former Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has a solid poll lead ahead of Sunday’s election against incumbent Jair Bolsonaro with a chance of winning the first-round race, new polls showed on Saturday.
Brazil’s most polarized election in decades will determine whether the left-wing leader, who has spent time in prison on corruption convictions, or the right-wing populist who has attacked the electoral system and threatened to contest defeat, returns to power.
Two polls released on Saturday showed Lula had the majority of valid votes, which would mean a clear victory to avoid a bloody runoff.
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Pollster IPEC showed Lula won 51% of valid votes, excluding blank and invalid ballots, and a Datafolha poll showed the popular two-year president received 50% of valid votes.
Both polls, conducted by some of Brazil’s most established polling teams, had a margin of error of 2 percentage points and showed Lula held a 14 percentage point advantage over Bolsonaro.
Two other polls released Saturday by CNT/MDA and Genial/Quaest showed Lula to be within error of overall victory with 48% and 49% of valid votes, respectively.
If none of the 11 presidential candidates get more than 50% of the valid votes, the top two candidates — almost certainly Lula and Bolsonaro — would go into a second round on October 30.
Brazil’s former President and presidential candidate Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva leads a silent march October 1, 2022 in Sao Paulo, Brazil. Portal/Mariana Griffin
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Lula told reporters he hopes to finish Sunday’s election: “I can only be optimistic. There is very little to do to get 50 percent plus one vote,” he said.
Bolsonaro, a 67-year-old former army captain who spent nearly three decades in Congress pushing his pro-gun, anti-gay and anti-abortion agendas, was swept into office in 2018 amid a spate of conservative backlash against Lula’s Labor Party.
He ended his re-election campaign with motorcycle rallies in Sao Paulo and the southern state of Santa Catarina.
Lula rode in an open-topped car and then walked with thousands of cheering supporters who turned up in central Sao Paulo, eager to see him despite the drizzle. The event was dubbed the “Walk of Victory.”
The Workers Party has booked a rally on Paulista Avenue in downtown Sao Paulo for Sunday night to celebrate the victory of the 76-year-old former union leader, who co-founded the party in 1980 and has run for the presidency six times.
Brazil’s electronic voting system, which Bolsonaro has described as prone to fraud without providing evidence, allows the National Elections Authority (TSE) to quickly assess results within hours of polling closing at 5 p.m. (2000 GMT).
The head of the TSE, Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes, tweeted, calling on Brazilians to celebrate the country’s democracy by voting “peace, security and harmony, respect and freedom.”
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Reporting by Anthony Boodle; Edited by Brad Haynes, Diane Craft and Jonathan Oatis
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