‘You lie every day’: Brazil’s Lula and Bolsonaro clash in feisty presidential debate

Final vote is 30 October

It is shaping up to be the most bitter election of the year.

And the first televised television debate between Brazil’s presidential candidates – Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and Jair Bolsonaro – did little to dispel that notion.

The two rivals clashed repeatedly with both repeatedly calling the other a liar during the 90-minute debate.

“You are a liar. You lie every day,” Mr da Silva, known commonly as “Lula” said to Mr Bolsonaro during one tense exchange.

Undaunted, Mr Bolsonaro countered: “You can’t come here to tell people these lies.”

In the first vote earlier this month, the socialist Lula won with 48 per cent of the vote compared to Mr Bolsonaro’s 43 per cent.

Although Lula was expected to lead, the result was something of a shock.

Against all predictions, right winger Mr Bolsonaro, the current Brazilian president, saw his vote hold up, easily ensuring a second vote will be needed on 30 October.

This went against what opinion polls had predicted. All had pointed to a Lula victory but some gave him such a lead that they suggested a second vote would not be necessary as he was on course to claim more than half of all votes.

That was unlikely as such an event has not happened this century in Brazilian elections.

But Mr Bolsonaro’s share of the first round was widely predicted to be around 31 per cent of the vote. The populist had long claimed the polls were wrong and had even threatened not to recognise the result of the election – similar to former US president Donald Trump – if he was defeated.

The subsequent result led to an immediate backlash, largely from Mr Bolsonaro himself, against polling companies.

The latest opinion polls indicate that ‘Lula’ remains the frontrunner, though his lead has shrunk considerably. (AP)

The president’s justice ministry called for a federal police investigation, and a regulator has already started work into whether pollsters formed a cartel to manipulate election results. Allies of Mr Bolsonaro in Congress are also pushing separate initiatives, one of which would establish prison sentences for polls failing to accurately predict results.

Despite that, the latest opinion polls, in so far as they can be trusted, indicate that Lula, himself a former president who governed Brazil between 2003 and 2010, remains the frontrunner, though his lead has shrunk considerably.

The pair are expected to take part in one more debate, days before the vote, on TV Globo, Brazil’s most popular network.

The threat of post-election violence remains considerable though, especially with the possibility of a Bolsonaro victory as it is unknown how he or his millions of supporters will react.