BRAZIL MAY BE on the verge of electing its first female president, but will have to hold a run-off election to see for sure whether Dilma Rousseff will get the country’s top political office.
In Sunday’s electoral ballot, with only a handful of votes left uncounted, Rousseff – of the ruling democratic socialist Workers Party – had been attributed with just under 47% of votes cast, short of the 50% plus one vote she needed to avoid a second ballot.
Rousseff, a former Marxist guerrila, will now face the second-placed Jose Serra, the former mayor of Sao Paulo, in the run-off election on October 31. Serra managed to accrue 32.6% of the votes cast, a higher-than-expected showing which saw him upset Rousseff’s plans of instant victory.
A defiant Rousseff said her campaigners would “again continue the conversation that we have been having since the beginning of this electoral campaign,” though she was clearly disappointed not to have made it over the line in the first ballot.
Even more embarrassing for Rousseff was the fact that she had been backed by the charismatic incumbent, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, but could not harness his immense popularity – the term-limited president enjoys approval ratings of above 80%.
Though Rousseff is still the clear favourite to win in the run-off, four weeks of extra campaigning time may be enough for Serra to turn the tide against her, and to win the support of the seven other candidates who took part in Sunday’s ballot.
The ruling coalition won a majority of the seats in the country’s Congress, which was also up for election on Sunday, meaning President Rousseff – if elected – would be well-placed to enact her legislative agenda which seeks to increase government control over oil and simplifying the tax code.
In other elections, former footballer Romario – best known for being Player of the Tournament at the 1994 World Cup – was elected to the Congress as a socialist, while his 1994 teammate Bebeto was elected to the state congress of Rio de Janeiro for Rousseff’s party.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
have your say