This year’s elections, the most polarized since Brazil regained democracy in 1985, have been characterized by a climate of tension between Lula and Bolsonaro, a dispute that spread to his followers, with some cases of attacks and deaths motivated by arguments. policies.
The electoral colleges of Brazil opened this Sunday for the presidential, legislative and regional elections, in which former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva appears as a favorite in all the polls once morest the current president, Jair Bolsonaro.
On this day, which began at 08:00 local time (same time in Chile) and will close at 17:00, some 156.4 million voters are called to elect the president, the 27 governors, the 513 deputies, to a third of the Senate and to renew the representatives in the regional legislative assemblies.
Once the polling stations close throughout the country, which for the first time will take place on a unified schedule, the Superior Electoral Court will begin to disseminate the first bulletins with official results.
Predictably, the count will be completed in a few hours, thanks to the electronic voting system that has been used in Brazil since 1996 and whose reliability has been questioned by Bolsonaro, despite the fact that there has never been any suspicion of fraud.
Lula in the first round?
According to the latest polls, released on Saturday, Lula has a clear advantage of fourteen percentage points over Bolsonaro, and would receive between 50% and 51% of the valid votes projected by the two most reputable polling companies in the country.
In the event that none of the candidates reaches more than half of the valid votes, the two most voted will have to face each other in a second round scheduled for October 30.
Voters will be able to exercise their right to vote in the 5,570 municipalities throughout the territory, the Federal District of Brasilia and the Fernando de Noronha archipelago, as well as 181 locations abroad.
polarized elections
The nearly half a million electronic ballot boxes installed in the country will once once more have an extensive security device, reinforced with Army troops, which will be present in 568 municipalities, mainly in the Amazon region and in some cities with high rates of violence, such as Rio de Janeiro.
This year’s elections, the most polarized since Brazil regained democracy in 1985, have been characterized by a climate of tension between Lula and Bolsonaro, a dispute that spread to his followers, with some cases of attacks and deaths motivated by arguments. policies.
