Bolsonaro waves after voting in Rio de Janeiro
Brazil looks set to pivot sharply to the right with the election of a former Army captain who wants to privatize state companies in an ailing economy, liberalize gun ownership and mine the rain forest.
Barring an upset, Jair Bolsonaro, 63, will win the presidency after a divisive campaign that encompassed his stabbing, an onslaught of fake news and the imprisonment on corruption charges of former president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who had been the front-runner. Lula’s successor, Fernando Haddad, 55, has largely failed to shake off public anger over his Workers’ Party’s record of graft.
So far, voters appear willing to give Bolsonaro the benefit of the doubt despite a history of skeptical statements about the virtues of Brazilian democracy during seven terms as a lawmaker. Last week, he scolded his son Eduardo, a 34-year-old federal deputy, when a July video surfaced in which he suggested closing the Supreme Court should judges impede his father’s presidency.
Bolsonaro has dipped in recent polls but has kept his strong lead in surveys by MDA and Datafolha pollsters released on the eve of Sunday’s runoff vote. He had 55 percent of support, against 45 percent for Haddad according to Datafolha.
Investors have ignored Bolsonaro’s authoritarian streak and bet he’ll deliver on his pro-market stance: Brazilian assets have surged with his rise. On Friday the benchmark Ibovespa index defied a slump in global assets to rise as much as 1.2 percent. The real was up by as much as 1 percent, leading gains in major currencies.
Haddad, by contrast, alarms money managers who fear a return to the Workers’ Party statist, free-spending policies. In the past few days, he has promised voters subsidized cooking gas and a 20 percent increase in some state benefits.
More than 147 million voters have 4 a.m. [Macau time] today to cast ballots. More than 550,000 electronic voting machines are in operation across the fifth-largest country, from tiny hamlets deep in the Amazon to the sprawling megalopolis of Sao Paulo.
While a victory appears all but assured, Bolsonaro’s margin will be an early indicator of his strength in dealing with Brazil’s Congress and the Supreme Court. Despite his allies’ strong showing in Oct. 7 congressional elections, the legislature remains divided among 30 parties. Bringing them into line won’t be easy.
“A comfortable win would make all the difference,” said Lucas de Aragao, a partner at Brasilia-based political consultancy Arko Advice, adding that it would give Bolsonaro “greater confidence negotiating with congress and more legitimacy in choosing his cabinet.”
Bolsonaro’s commitment to liberalize the economy is both recent and decidedly vague – as well as dependent on both congress and his politically inexperienced future finance minister, Paulo Guedes. Bloomberg
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