Brazilians are choosing their leaders Sunday Oct 07,2018 in an election marked by intense anger at the ruling class following years of political and economic turmoil, including what may be the largest corruption scandal in Latin American history.
Who is being elected?
Voters will choose the country's 38th president and all 27 of Brazil's state governors.
Also up for grabs are most of the seats in Congress -
including two-thirds of the 81-member upper-house Senate and all 513
places in the lower-house Chamber of Deputies - and 1,059 positions
within state legislatures.
Jair Bolsonaro, the far-right politician and former army captain is the frontrunner in Sunday Oct 07,2018 's critical elections.
Running in second is Fernando Haddad, the centre-left former mayor of Sao Paulo, who stepped in to take over the Workers' Party candidacy after former President Luiz Inacio Da Silva - who was leading the race - was barred from running because he is in jail serving a sentence for corruption
The latest opinion poll released Thursday Oct 04,2018 found Bolsonaro had 35 percent support, a 3 percentage point jump since Tuesday Oct 02,2018
Haddad of the leftist Workers Party (Partido dos Trabalhadores or PT), stood at 22 percent. The pair remain deadlocked in a possible runoff vote, according to the Datafolha poll.
The poll showed Bolsonaro has 39 percent of the valid votes, 11 points short of a majority needed for a first-round victory. Failing that, the two top vote-getters will face off on Oct. 28,2018
After ruling Brazil for 13 of the last 15 years, the PT is blamed by many for a crippling recession, rising violence and voracious corruption.
Former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva led initial polls by a wide margin, but was banned from running after a corruption conviction.
Bolsonaro was stabbed at a rally in early September and campaigned from a hospital bed in recent weeks. And all along, Brazilians have said their faith in their leaders and their hopes for the future are waning.
This election was once seen as the great hope for ending a turbulent era in which many politicians and business executives were jailed on corruption charges, a president was impeached and removed from office in controversial proceedings, and the economy suffered a protracted recession.
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