Sputnik International By Allison Dubois
Brazilians flooded the polls on Sunday to elect a new president in what turned out to be an extremely close runoff competition between two of the biggest names in Brazilian politics eyeing drastically different versions of Brazilâs future.
Former Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva clinched Brazil’s top job Sunday after besting incumbent Jair Bolsonaro with 50.90% of the vote, figures released by the country’s election authority confirmed.
With 99.96% of the ballots counted, Bolsonaro gained 49.10%. The ouster marks the end of a politically heightened period for Brazil as Bolsonaro gained widespread attention for his accelerated destruction of the Amazon rainforest and the government’s failure to effectively implement preventative COVID-19 measures such as masking practices. Brazil documented nearly 700,000 covid-related deaths.
Earlier, a congressional inquiry recommended Bolsonaro be charged with nine offenses, including charlatanism and crimes against humanity, for his handling of the COVID-19 pandemic. It is unclear if those charges will be handed down once Bolsonaro passes the presidency to da Silva.
The elected president had more than 60.2 million votes, a record in the history of Brazilian democracy. He will begin his third presidential term on January 1st, 2023. Da Silva previously served as president from 2003 to 2010.
