After a tense and tight race, former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva will return to the presidency on January 1, after receiving more than 60 million votes and defeating current President Jair Bolsonaro. This will be Lula’s third term, after serving two consecutive terms from 2003 to 2010.

Having spent 580 day in prison for corruption charges beginning in April 2018 —thus being barred from the 2018 presidential election— in his victory on Sunday, the founder and honorary president of Brazil’s Workers’ Party spoke of his “resurrection.”

This is the first time in the nearly 40 years since the return of democracy in Brazil that a president wasn’t able to win reelection.

At the time of this reporting, Bolsonaro had yet to concede defeat. Thousands of his supporters, in different parts of the country, had blocked roads demanding that the armed forces stage a coup.

Full article at Latino Rebels’ website. Date of publication: 31/10/2022.