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RIO DE JANEIRO.
The Brazilians will decide today whether, over the next four years, they will be ruled by the far right Jair Bolsonaro, who heads the elections, or by the leftist Fernando Haddad, who tried to form a "front" democratic "to prevent the victory of the apologist from the military dictatorship.
Bolsonaro, a 63-year-old former army captain, won the first round with 46 percent of the vote, compared to 29 percent for Haddad of the Workers' Party (PT). The polls of this second round predict a victory of 56% to 44%.
His constituents have paid more attention to his pledge to fight rampant crime by easing the wearing of arms and his denunciations of corruption than his misogynistic, homophobic and racist explosions or his lack of important initiatives over the past decade. of his 27 years of deputy.
The winner will have to govern next to a congress with parties weakened by scandals and dominated by the lobbies food conservatives, evangelical churches and advocates of the port of arms.
The PT will remain the first force in the House, despite the fact that it has lost several MPs after being one of the parties most affected by corruption investigations in Petrobras. This scandal has led to the imprisonment of its historic leader, former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (2003-2010), who is serving a 12-year sentence of imprisonment since April.
Haddad, 55, was nominated in September, replacing Lula.
Its takeoff was based on the millions of Brazilians who benefited from Lula's social inclusion policies. But after the first round, he did not get more than the "critical support" of the main center-left leaders, who blame the PT for its politico-financial maneuvers during his years in power.
Who will be elected on January 1, 2019 replaced the conservative Michel Temer, the most unpopular president since the return of democracy, who took office in 2016 after the dismissal of Dilma Rousseff, PT, accused of manipulation of public accounts.
DEMOCRACY IN DANGER?
Haddad promised to fight until the last breath to prevent "fascism from settling in Brazil"; and Lula asked the prison to relegate the differences between "Democrats". "We can not let despair lead Brazil to a fascist adventure," he warned.
Bolsonaro, who still wears a colostomy bag following a wrist injury in the abdomen in September, campaigned mostly on social networks, without participating in any debate, alleging a medical prescription. His convalescence did not at all mitigate his violent tirades.
Either they leave or they go to jail. These marginal fringes will be banned from our homeland, "he shouted a week ago during a phone call to Sao Paulo.
This "enraged" harangue led Alberto Goldman, former governor of Sao Paulo and member of the PSDB (party of former president Fernando Henrique Cardoso) to the center-right leadership, to announce that he would vote for Haddad .
Goldman believes that democratic institutions will resist a Bolsonaro government. "But I'm not willing to pay to check it," he said.
Márcio Coimbra, coordinator of postgraduate programs in international relations at Mackenzie Presbyterian College (USA), said Bolsonaro could take measures "that affect democracy". Brazil, he says, has "a strong public ministry, a strong supreme court and an open convention".
It is possible that he will reform the Constitution to fit his agenda, but that it will not affect democracy, "he said.
TWO DIFFERENT AGES OF GOLD
Bolsonaro and Haddad intend to relive heroic, though different, times.
The slogan of the PT campaign, "The Happy People Again", evokes the "golden age" of Lula governments, with a thriving economy driven by high prices of agricultural products.
The lost paradise of Bolsonaro is another: "We want a country similar to that of 40 or 50 years ago," he said in a radio interview. The reference period, from 1968 to 1978, was the hardest of the military dictatorship, characterized by persecution and torture of opponents. But it was also at the beginning of the Brazilian "economic miracle", a project of industrialization.
In foreign policy, Bolsonaro has shown his willingness to approach the American Donald Trump, including increasing pressure on Venezuela's socialist regime, in the midst of economic and social turmoil. Haddad wants to strengthen South-South relations.
In case of victory, Bolsonaro's economic guru, Paulo Guedes, will attempt to launch a privatization program aimed at reducing debt and reactivating the economy, which stems from two years of recession and another two years of economic activity. low growth.
But faced with resistance in his own domain, Bolsonaro had to make it clear that he would only privatize the peripheral activities of Petrobras or Eletrobras and would exclude the participation of foreign groups in the production of energy.
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