Sao Paulo, Brazil – President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva brushed aside corruption allegations and won re-election in a landslide as Brazilians rewarded their first working-class leader for diminishing grinding poverty and improving the economy of Latin America’s largest nation.
The leftist former union leader cruised to a runoff victory Sunday with strong support from tens of millions of poor voters, easily topping center-right rival Geraldo Alckmin, whose tepid campaign style and robotic image failed to win over ordinary Brazilians.
With 99 percent of the votes counted, Silva had 61 percent support compared to 39 percent for Alckmin, Sao Paulo state’s former governor.
“We’re going to do a lot better in my second term than we did in the first,” Silva told cheering supporters in a Sao Paulo hotel. “The foundation is in place, and now we have to get to work.” Beaming in a white T-shirt emblazoned with “It’s Brazil’s Victory” in the yellow and green colors of the Brazilian flag, Silva promised to boost growth and reduce inequality to put the country on track to reach the ranks of developed nations.
Alckmin congratulated Silva in a telephone call, then told reporters he planned to stay in politics but didn’t outline his next steps. He made no reference to the corruption allegations against Silva’s party that he pressed during the campaign.
“Life and democracy are similar. Sometimes you win, sometimes you have hard times,” Alckmin said.
Silva’s win came after Alckmin made a surprisingly strong showing in a first round of voting on Oct. 1. The vote went to a second round after Silva failed to get 50 percent plus one vote required for an outright win.
But Silva had the firm support of Brazil’s poor, who have benefited over the past three years as Silva increased social spending without raising taxes. Silva also overcame corruption scandals that tarnished the image of his administration.
While Alckmin was seen as more business-friendly, investors and big business from Brazil to Wall Street gave high marks to Silva’s conservative economic policies that prompted slow and sustainable economic growth with rising foreign investment.
While Silva came to power four years ago by employing strong leftist rhetoric, he ended up governing as a centrist and is considered much more moderate than South American leftist leaders like Bolivia’s Evo Morales and Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez. Analysts said Silva probably won’t change much in his second term.
His Workers Party has been battered for two years by charges of vote-buying and illegal campaign financing, scandals that have cost the former labor leader and lathe operator his reputation as a bastion of political ethics.
Nearly 126 million Brazilians voted in Sunday’s runoff elections for president and for governor in 10 of Brazil’s 27 states.
Polls before the first round of voting had predicted Silva would win outright then, but his campaign was tripped up after the news media ran photos of $770,000 in cash that members of his Workers Party allegedly planned to spend purchasing an incriminating file about Alckmin and his allies.
Regardless, Alckmin failed to make the corruption charges stick to Silva during the second round.
Instead, Silva battered his opponent with accusations that the former governor of Brazil’s richest state would privatize cherished state industries and end the popular Family Allowance program that provides monthly payouts to 11 million poor families as long as they keep their children in school and get them vaccinated.
Silva managed to funnel more money to the program because of the country’s improving economy and through more aggressive tax collection, and Alckmin was forced to defend himself by saying he would maintain the program, which has helped lift millions out of poverty.
Also, Silva managed to reduce Brazil’s notoriously high inflation through high interest rates, and prices of staples such as rice and beans even dropped.
Aloisio Pisco, a 36-year-old doorman, said Silva’s handling of the economy earned him the right to a second term.
“Lula, he’s the best; he’s created jobs and prices are cheaper,” Pisco said after voting in Sao Paulo.
Others said Alckmin deserved high marks for his adept administration of Sao Paulo state.
“I thought Alckmin was better prepared to become president,” said Reginaldo Fernando Pittarelli, 29-year-old machinery designer.
“And I would have never voted for Lula because of all the corruption surrounding his government.”
