() — In Brazil, left-wing candidate Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva traded blows with right-wing incumbent President Jair Bolsonaro on Sunday night in a televised debate ahead of the Oct. 30 second-round presidential election.
It was the first presidential debate of the second round and was broadcast by Bandeirantes Television.
Lula criticized Bolsonaro’s handling of the covid-19 pandemic while both candidates accused each other of corruption.
“You delayed the vaccine. And the hard fact is that their negligence caused the deaths of 680,000 people when more than half could have been saved. In the history of any government in the world, there is no one who has played with the pandemic and death like you did,” Lula told Bolsonaro.
In response, Bolsonaro denied the accusations and said that Lula was lying. He added that he initially did not purchase vaccines in an effort to prevent corruption.
“There was no corruption because there was no vaccine in Brazil. So, Mr. Lula, stop lying, it’s bad even for your age,” Bolsonaro said.
Lula responded to this: “You are the king of fake news, you are the king of stupidity, of lying to Brazilian society. He lied the entire time about the vaccine; he neglected the vaccine.”
The two candidates also discussed the issue of corruption.
Bolsonaro accused Lula and his Workers’ Party of having links to organized crime in the country. In response, Lula also said that Bolsonaro had ties to people connected to organized crime.
The latest Datafolha poll published on Friday shows Lula in the lead with 53% of the intention to vote in the second round, while Bolsonaro has 47%.
