The final television debate before a historic election with significant implications for the Amazon rainforest, the global climate emergency, and the future of one of the largest democracies in the world featured a showdown between the two political heavyweights vying to become Brazil's next president.
The far-right incumbent Jair Bolsonaro and the former leftist president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva squared off in Rio at the studios of Brazil's largest broadcaster. On the day of the election, surveys gave Lula a slim but not insurmountable lead.
During the heated exchange, Lula accused Bolsonaro of mismanaging the Covid outbreak, which has claimed the lives of over 700,000 Brazilians, arming organised crime by relaxing gun regulations, degrading the Amazon, and damaging Brazil's reputation abroad. Brazil is further away from the world than Cuba.
Bolsonaro repeatedly branded Lula a liar and brought up the corruption issues that marred the 14 years that the former president's Workers' party (PT) ruled from 2003 to 2016. Bolsonaro appeared obviously anxious and frequently lost his balance on stage. Bolsonaro yelled, "Lula, you're a crook." "Your government was the corruption kingpin."
Lula responded, quoting one of bossa nova great Tom Jobim's most well-known tunes, "He's a one-note samba."
In his final remarks, Bolsonaro said he would, God willing, be re-elected to the Brazilian congress, where he had previously served for over three decades before reinventing himself as an anti-establishment outsider and winning the presidency in 2018.
The most populous nation in Latin America is divided over this year's election, which is widely seen as the most significant since the end of Brazil's 21-year dictatorship in 1985. Roughly half of voters rejected Bolsonaro, while nearly as many rejected Lula.
Voters who supported Lula see Bolsonaro as an inept dictator who ruined the environment and Brazil's standing in the world, botched the country's reaction to Covid, and tore society apart with his radical, anti-social speech. Supporters of Bolsonaro view Lula, who served as president for two terms from 2003 to 2010, as a dishonest "communist" danger whose interactions with leftist autocrats like Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela and Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua make a mockery of his claim to be fighting for democracy.
Donald Trump, Bolsonaro's main ally internationally, entered the discussion on Friday, calling Lula "a extreme left madman who will swiftly destroy your country" and pushing Brazilians to reject him.
Supporters of Lula worry that if he loses, Bolsonaro, a dictatorship admiring former army captain who has said he will contest an outcome he thinks "abnormal," could incite unrest akin to that caused by Donald Trump. These worries heightened last week after one of Bolsonaro's kids claimed his father was the victim of "the greatest electoral fraud ever seen" using unsubstantiated charges of electoral fraud - language that was eerily similar to Trump's after he lost the 2020 US election to Joe Biden.
Bolsonaro appeared to pledge to respect the outcome during the discussion on Friday. He declared, "He gets the most votes wins.
Tens of millions of civilians are certain to be devastated, whichever party wins. Dhennis Wheberth, a Bolsonaro activist and evangelical preacher - his movement remains largely loyal to the president - declared, "I'll relocate to Finland the next day," if Lula wins.
Re-electing Bolsonaro, according to progressive church leader Henrique Vieira, who backs Lula, would give him carte blanche to punish his adversaries on the left and possibly even try to shut down congress.
I think Bolsonaro's victory again would be disastrous for Brazilian democracy. Vieira, a recent congressman for the socialist Socialism and Liberty party, warned that the president-elect is a fascist and an authoritarian (PSL).
Vieira, who has spent recent weeks fighting to undermine Bolsonaro's reputation as a "upstanding" Christian via street rallies and social media films that label him the "anti-Christ," declared that "defeating Bolsonaro and electing Lula is a historic job."
Nevertheless, Lula's supporters have recently expressed cautious confidence as surveys indicate that his advantage against Bolsonaro has increased to about 6%.
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