Former Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and current President Jair Bolsonaro faced each other on Sunday in their first debate, two weeks before the second round of elections.
The debates before the first round included several other candidates, none of whom won more than 5% of the vote in the October 2 election, and were largely distracting for the two obvious frontrunners.
On Sunday, Lula and Bolsonaro called each other a liar during an hour and a half meeting. Each used the term more than a dozen times in the debate on TV Band, which was otherwise less hostile than many pundits anticipated.
“You’re a liar. You lie every day,” the leftist Lula said at one point. Bolsonaro frequently expressed: “You can’t come here to tell people these lies.”
Lula won the first electoral round with 48% of the vote against 43% for Bolsonaro, whose government is from the right. Polls indicate that Lula, who governed the country between 2003 and 2010, remains the favourite, although his lead has narrowed considerably.
Each candidate focused on issues that, according to the polls, represent the weak points of his opponent: for Bolsonaro, the COVID-19 pandemic that claimed the lives of 680,000 Brazilians, and for Lula the corruption scandals that his Party has suffered. Workers.
Lula and Bolsonaro plan to participate in an additional debate before the elections, which will take place on TV Globo, the most popular network in Brazil.
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