beyondbrics

The phoney war is over and the real campaigning got under way on Tuesday in the run-up to Brazil’s elections in October. Brazilians will be bombarded by four 50-minute blocks of electoral propaganda every day – morning and noon on radio, lunchtime and evening on television – until September 30.

In theory, the campaign will give the biggest boost to Dilma Rousseff, candidate of the left-wing ruling PT and chosen successor to Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the most popular president in Brazilian history.

If so she can, as they say in Portuguese, start singing victory. The two latest opinion polls, one published at the weekend, the other today, give her a good chance of outright victory in the first round on October 3, with no need for a run-off on October 31. (Scroll down this story for an infographic on the latest polls.)

This will be a heavy blow for José Serra, candidate of the centrist opposition PSDB. He led opinion polls until the middle of this year. Until recently Serra was much better known than Dilma and could point to an impressive record as minister of planning and then health under the previous administration and as mayor of São Paulo city and governor of São Paulo state (from which he stood down this year to run as president).

But Dilma has always had a trump card up her sleeve: Lula’s backing. This year Lula began campaigning heavily on her behalf (and has been repeatedly fined by electoral courts for doing so). His endorsement has begun to sink in. At the same time, Dilma has begun to build her own personality, making it clear she would be more than Lula’s front woman.

The two latest polls are the first since the first televised debate between the leading presidential candidates on August 5. No candidate scored a clear victory on that occasion but Dilma has clearly reaped the greater reward.

Her campaign onslaught will to be hard for Serra to withstand. His best chance had always been to enter the formal campaign period on a level footing with Dilma and hope to limit the damage thereafter to leave himself with a chance of taking her into a two-way run-off.

But if campaign funding is any guide, his chances are slipping fast. According to a partial assessment by Brazil’s electoral courts, Dilma had raised R$9.7m for her campaign by August 3. Serra had raised just R$2.7m – less even than Marina Silva, the third-placed candidate, with R$3.5m.

Serra says the answer is serious campaign proposals, not glitzy television shows. Voters may not agree. And so far, Serra’s serious campaign proposal seems to be that he is the best person to continue Lula’s work, not Dilma. That won’t wash for long once Lula really gets into action on Dilma’s behalf.

Related reading:
Brazil’s TV debate: ports, rates and Lula’s shadow, beyondbrics
Who will lead Brazil?, FT