RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil — He is more than two million votes behind his main rival and has just 20 days to claw his way back: Does Brazil’s veteran leftist Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva have another comeback in him?
Lula, 80, who has risen from the political ashes several times, is heading to a runoff election against right-wing senator Flavio Bolsonaro after a shock second-place finish in Sunday’s first-round vote.
“Do you think I wasn’t disappointed?” Lula said on Monday as Brazil’s left reeled from a rout that also saw conservatives make massive gains in Congress.
“We need to sleep less and work more,” said Lula, adding that he was “convinced” he could still win a fourth nonconsecutive term in office.
While supporters hail Lula’s social programs, many voters are fed up with the status quo, citing violence, the cost of living and a constant stream of corruption scandals.
A victory in the Oct. 25 runoff is “difficult, unlikely, but not impossible,” Beto Vasques, an analyst at the School of Sociology and Politics of Sao Paulo (FESPSP), told Agence France-Presse (AFP).
Nowhere to go
Flavio Bolsonaro secured 47 percent of the votes to Lula’s 45.
Another 8 percent went to third-party candidates who were mostly conservative.
“The most serious issue for Lula is the sense that he no longer has anywhere to find new votes,” said Luciana Veiga of the Getulio Vargas Foundation.
His plan is to target the 33 million registered voters who did not show up to the polls — around 21 percent of the electorate.
“We have to convince them. It is our responsibility to rekindle their interest in voting,” Lula said during a meeting with allies in the capital Brasilia.
Vasques said that even a slight drop in the abstention vote could shift the result.
However, Veiga does not view nonvoters, a group that has been steadily growing in Brazilian elections, as a “gold mine.”
She sees greater potential in persuading the 5 percent who cast blank or null votes to change their minds.
Marco Aurelio de Carvalho, a local coordinator for Lula’s campaign, said he was “confident” of a turnaround for the left, amid a wave of conservative victories in Latin America and beyond.
“The whole world has its eyes on Brazil. We must step up, because we can turn the situation around,” he told AFP.
No successor in sight
Lula rose from a childhood of deep poverty to become a union leader and lost three presidential bids before he was elected in 2002 and again in 2006.
After being jailed over a major corruption scandal on charges that were annulled on jurisdictional grounds, he made a spectacular return to office in 2023.
This year, Lula appears to have few cards left to play.
His first-round campaign leaned heavily on the cause of sovereignty in the face of pressure from United States President Donald Trump.
He increased social welfare benefits and banned sports betting in the days leading up to the polls.
To win over voters ahead of the runoff, the campaign aims to highlight the track record of Flavio Bolsonaro’s father, former far-right president Jair Bolsonaro, such as his catastrophic handling of the Covid-19 pandemic and funding cuts.
Before the second round, Lula’s government hopes to pass a constitutional reform to reduce working hours and mandate two days of rest per week, as many workers only have one day off a week.
But he is facing an uphill battle as a conservative-leaning Senate weighs the reform.
