Brazil’s Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has won a historic fourth term as president, defeating the far-right candidate Flávio Bolsonaro in a dramatic comeback.
A viral WhatsApp channel and student-led protests played a key role in the veteran Brazilian leftist’s election victory.
A mood of dismay swept Brazil’s left, and because 9 million voters for the other candidates, all of them on the right, were expected to mostly transfer to senator Flávio Bolsonaro, analysts widely saw the far-right senator’s victory as certain.
Lula is the first candidate to win a runoff election after losing in the first round – taking victory with 51.79% of the vote to his rival’s 48.21%.
His win bucks a regional trend, after the son of the former president Jair Bolsonaro had spearheaded a radical populist movement. But with Flávio Bolsonaro refusing to concede defeat, what’s next for Brazil?
Leaders and governments worldwide congratulate Lula on dramatic comeback seen as an important signal to rest of Latin America.
“This is God’s work – and it’s thanks to all of you,” Lula told tens of thousands of supporters who had gathered in central São Paulo in the early hours of Monday to celebrate his dramatic election comeback.
A few hours earlier, Lula pulled off the most stunning political fightback in modern Brazilian history, bouncing back from a first-round defeat in early October to trounce Bolsonaro by more than 4m votes in the runoff.
“Today is a historic day,” Lula declared, before telling a sea of elated supporters: “Democracy always, dictatorship never again. Democracy always, fascism never again.”
Never, since the return of democracy after the 1964-85 military regime, had the first-round loser managed to win the second vote.
But Lula did precisely that prompting joyous scenes on the streets of São Paulo and cities all across Brazil. He won with 64.2m votes to Bolsonaro’s 59.8m, a 51.79% to 48.21% victory. It was at least 10m more votes than Lula secured in the first round.
The streets and social media drove Lula to a historic comeback
The election results could be explained by a combination of the streets, social media and the machinery of government.
Lula approved a “package of benefits” at the limits of what electoral law allows, including increasing and bringing forward payments from the main cash-transfer programme for poor families.
“The streets and social media almost overlap,” said a researcher with the Representation and Democratic Legitimacy group at the Federal University of Paraná.
Two days after the first round, congressman André Janones, a Lula ally, created a WhatsApp channel called “Lula’s Army”, where Janones sent audio messages, videos – often beginning with shouts of “Guys, urgent!”.
The channel had 60,000 followers by the end of its first day and, by election Sunday, more than 10 million, and Lula’s digital reach overtook Bolsonaro’s.
In his third term, Lula oversaw a drop in inflation and unemployment, and lifted millions out of hunger, but many voters felt gloomy about the high cost of living and crime.
Flavio Bolsonaro, 45, pitched himself as more moderate and jovial than his father and managed to galvanize conservatives as well as less ideological voters wanting something new. "We're in a deep hole, things are dire. People can barely afford to eat -- buying meat is out of the question," said Tereza Cristina Ramos, a 68-year-old retiree, who voted in Rio de Janeiro.
Already one of the world's oldest leaders, Lula will be 85 by the end of his new term in 2030. He is also facing a hostile Congress dominated by the right. Lula's campaign leaned heavily on the theme of sovereignty in the face of commercial and diplomatic pressure from Trump's United States.
"This country will not accept being anyone's backyard," he said Sunday.
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