Financial Times (Reino Unido) – Brazil's presidential candidates eye shift to centre in bid for votes

Financial Times (Reino Unido) – Brazil's presidential candidates eye shift to centre in bid for votes

 

When far-right presidential candidate Jair Bolsonaro voted in the first round of Brazil's elections on Sunday, the ex-paratrooper gave a simple thumbs up to the gathered cameras instead of his trademark finger guns.

 

For a congressman who has spent his career advocating a shoot-first policy against criminals and yearning for Brazil's former military dictatorship, analysts said the change of campaign gesture represented the start of a shift to the centre.

 

Mr Bolsonaro underlined the message later in the day, with a victory speech that lacked his usual vitriol. He won the first round with 46 per cent of votes compared with 29 per cent for his main rival, Fernando Haddad of the leftist Workers' party, or PT, just short of the simple majority needed for an outright first round win.

 

"There remains for us only two paths — the one of prosperity, of liberty, of family, of those who are on the side of God . . . and, on the other side, [the path] of Venezuela," Mr Bolsonaro said in his victory speech on YouTube.

 

As Brazil braces for the second round of the election on October 28, Latin America's largest country stands at one of its most important crossroads since it returned to democracy from authoritarian rule in the mid-1980s.

 

Once on the fringes of Brazilian politics for his disparaging remarks against women, homosexuals and blacks, as well as his admiration for known torturers during the dictatorship, Mr Bolsonaro is the first far rightwing politician with a real chance of ruling the country in more than 30 years.

 

He has sold himself as an "outsider" in spite of having served 27 years in congress. He has campaigned on traditional "family" values, capitalising on popular discontent with establishment political parties such as the PT and its rival, the centrist Brazilian Social Democracy party, which are tainted by sweeping corruption investigations and the country's worst recession in history. And, taking a page from the playbook of US President Donald Trump, he has used social media to bypass Brazil's traditionally dominant television news outlets.

 

"We lament that a part of the Brazilian press doesn't open its eyes, what do they expect [to gain] with the ascension or the return of the PT to power?" said Mr Bolsonaro.

 

However, Thiago de Aragão, partner at Arko Advice, a political risk consultancy, also believes that Mr Bolsonaro's campaign benefited from unexpected events, including being stabbed in September. The incident left him seriously injured and hospitalised for days. But despite being off the campaign trail, the stabbing won him blanket television coverage and attention on social media.

 

Deep dissatisfaction with the PT also helped. Mr Bolonaro won in every state except in the poor north-east, which remains loyal to the party's founder, former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva who is in jail for corruption. Mr Lula da Silva is revered among low-income earners for the social welfare programmes he introduced while president between 2003 and 2010.

 

"The growth of Bolsonaro is a due to a range of factors including his symbolism as an anti-establishment individual. It also represents the end of the PT era," said Mr Aragão.

 

For the PT's Mr Haddad, the challenge will be to move to the centre if he wants to win, according to analysts.

 

The lawyer, economist and philosopher can expect to receive many of the votes of Ciro Gomes, another leftist politician who won 12.5 per cent in the election, plus about 1.5 per cent from other candidates.

 

But voters who backed centre-right candidates, such as former São Paulo governor Geraldo Alckmin of the PSDB, whose once dominant party was all but destroyed in the first round, are more likely to go to Mr Bolsonaro. To win over some of these voters — plus the near 30 per cent of the electorate who were absent or voted null or blank — Mr Haddad will need to distance himself from Mr Lula da Silva.

 

"The big question now is whether Haddad can somehow move to the centre and convince moderates that he is his own man, rather than Lula's puppet. Easier said than done," said Oliver Stuenkel, assistant professor of international relations at the Getulio Vargas Foundation in São Paulo.

 

The other task for Mr Haddad is to win over the markets. Mr Bolsonaro delivered his first-round victory speech flanked by economic adviser, a University of Chicago-trained economist, who has helped lend credibility to his promises of liberal reforms to rein in Brazil's oversized state and budget deficits.

 

Mr Haddad, on the other hand, has scared markets with pledges to use state spending to stimulate consumption — the problem that many believe helped cause Brazil's recession in the first place.

 

Marcos Casarin, of Oxford Economics, said the PT leader needed to move to the centre quickly on economic policy. "If they don't come up with an announcement of a market-friendly finance minister in the next few days, I think they are going to lose precious time," he said.