More than 125 million Brazilians are going to the polls this Sunday, October 29, to cast ballots in a runoff presidential election with President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva expected to win another term in office.
Polls released Saturday show Lula with 22% percent more votes than his opponent, former São Paulo governor Geraldo Alckmin. DataFolha and Ibope give Lula 61% of the valid votes against 39% for Alckmin.
It these numbers are confirmed Lula would have won by a similar margin of his first election four years ago. The polls will be open from 8 am to 5 pm. Final results are expected to be released today before midnight.
In a Saturday campaign rally Lula promised that he would make peace with the opposition after the election. He also said that his party, the PT, will go trough a radical reform.
The president voted in an elementary school in São Bernardo do Campo, in the ABCD region in the Greater São Paulo, the same city where he started his political career as a union leader.
Alckmin predicted he would get an upset victory. He said Brazilians understood the need for change and know it is the vote that changes things.
He was applauded when he cast his vote in the morning in São Paulo. The former governor of São Paulo was accompanied by his wife Lu Alckmin and three children as well as former president Fernando Henrique Cardoso and São Paulo’s governor elect, José Serra.
