This Sunday at 8:00 AM --12:00 PM in mainland Spain-- voting has begun in Brazil, where more than 158 million citizens are called to decide between the current president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and the candidate Flávio Bolsonaro in the second round of the elections to choose the head of State.
This is the tenth presidential election since the restoration of democracy, in which Bolsonaro, the far-right Liberal Party candidate, and Lula, the representative of the Workers' Party, are competing.
Bolsonaro faces this event with a slight advantage, as he won by a narrow margin in the first round of the elections, held on October 4, with 47.03% compared to Lula's 45.16%. If his victory is confirmed, it would create the unprecedented situation of consolidating a true family clan in the Palácio do Planalto, following the presidency of his father, Jair Bolsonaro, from 2019 to 2023.
Flávio's stepmother, Michelle Bolsonaro, and his brother Carlos Bolsonaro hold seats in the Senate, while Jair Renan Bolsonaro, the youngest son of the former president, has been elected as a federal deputy. This strong presence of Jair Bolsonaro's relatives contrasts with his detention a year ago and his disqualification until 2030 for electoral fraud and for encouraging the attempted coup on January 8, 2023.
On this day, a president and governor are also being elected in five additional states and in the federal district of Brasília. About 136 million Brazilians are required to go to the polls, while for another 22 million, voting is voluntary.
Lula, for his part, faces the historic challenge of attempting to achieve a victory in the second round without having been the most voted in the first round, something unprecedented in the democratic era of the country. If he wins, he would add his fourth presidential term.
The latest polls released on Saturday by the institutes Quaest and Datafolha indicate a slight advantage for Bolsonaro (51-49%), which in statistical terms amounts to a technical tie, as the difference falls within the margin of error. In 2022, Lula won the elections with 50.9% of the votes compared to Jair Bolsonaro's 49.1%.