Bolsonaro and Lula fight it out in Brazil’s swing state

Down a residential alleyway where telenovela soap operas vie for attention with barking dogs, Vitoria Carolina has a disheartening message for Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro and his re-election campaign.

The unemployed 23-year-old is glad of a recent increase in welfare payments for the country’s poorest, a crucial target demographic for the far-right populist. But she is adamant the extra income will not sway her at the ballot box in October.

“It’s just a strategy to win votes. It isn’t going to influence mine,” she said from the outskirts of Belo Horizonte, the capital of the south-eastern state of Minas Gerais. Like many other residents in the deprived hillside community of Granja de Freitas, she remains loyal to Bolsonaro’s leftwing rival Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the former president whose party built the social housing in which she lives.

As Latin America’s largest democracy gears up for the most heated contest since its military dictatorship ended almost four decades ago, the two leading contenders are trying to make inroads in Brazil’s bellwether state. Home to the country’s second-largest population of voters — 16mn, or about one in 10 of the Brazilian electorate — Minas Gerais has been carried by every successful candidate since the restoration of direct presidential elections in 1989.

In a campaign where the economy and squeezed living standards are at the forefront of the debate, Minas Gerais and its neighbouring states of São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro will be “the key battlefield”, according to Mauricio Moura, chief executive at polling company Ideia Big Data.

“The swing voters — people who could vote for either side and are most outside the bubbles of both candidates — are very concentrated [in the three states],” Moura added.

Lula, the frontrunner to win the election according to polls, chose Belo Horizonte to host his first official rally this month. Days earlier, Bolsonaro launched his campaign in Juiz de Fora, another city in Minas Gerais, where four years ago he was stabbed and almost killed while on the stump.

In 2018, citizens tired of corruption scandals and political and economic crises backed the nationalist former army captain’s platform of anti-graft and smaller government, while his support for conservative values won over many evangelical Christians.

But the 67-year-old’s ratings have suffered from the economic fallout of Covid-19 and discontent with his handling of the pandemic. Nationally, Lula has 47 per cent of first-round voting intentions compared with 32 per cent for Bolsonaro, according to the latest polling by Datafolha. It also gave the leftist a lead in Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo and Minas Gerais, the country’s most populous and rich states.

With its diverse social and economic make-up, Minas Gerais holds clues as to whether Bolsonaro can continue to narrow the gap to his 76-year-old rival, who was president for two terms between 2003 and 2010. Larger in size than mainland France, the landlocked state has a strong agribusiness sector, rich mineral deposits and a steelmaking industry. But it is also marked by impoverishment, especially in its northern region.

Known as Mineiros, the state’s inhabitants tend to be conservative and moderate in their political outlook, according to Paulo Paiva, an economist at the Fundação Dom Cabral business school in Belo Horizonte. Many low-income voters in the urban peripheries who were traditionally sympathetic to Lula’s Workers’ party (PT) backed Bolsonaro in 2018.

“The dispute will be in the metropolitan region among the lower-middle class,” he said, adding that he believed wealthier voters “will give Bolsonaro a greater vote than the polls say”. Almost two-thirds of voters in Belo Horizonte backed the far-right politician in 2018, higher than the national rate of 55 per cent.

In the city’s downtown area, cab driver Vinicios Costa da Silva praised the social advances made in Lula’s first term. But he grew disillusioned by the corruption scandals that tainted the PT.

“Bolsonaro talks a lot and doesn’t think about what he says,” added Costa da Silva, a cross hanging from his cab’s rear-view mirror. “On the other hand, what I see as positive is his honesty.” 

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Confectionery entrepreneur Geraldo Miagella, 45, from Abaeté, a city about 200km north-west of Belo Horizonte, also said he voted for Lula in the past but would back Bolsonaro again because he was “doing a good job”.

“He’s reduced corruption a lot,” he added. “I think with four more years he will manage to achieve his goals.”

The president’s aggressive stances, which include questioning the integrity of the country’s electronic voting system, are too much for some Mineiros. In Belo Horizonte’s upscale Belvedere district, Carla Caricatti accused Bolsonaro of polarising Brazil.

“Saviour of the fatherland? He hasn’t saved anyone,” said the 42-year-old lawyer who plans to vote for Lula: “He isn’t perfect, but we are without another option.”

For many voters, economic issues will matter more than the contrasting world views of Bolsonaro and Lula, say analysts.

“Lula has a positive factor: the memory of people coming out of poverty,” said Reginaldo Lopes, a federal PT lawmaker co-ordinating Lula’s campaign in Minas Gerais.

Though unemployment and inflation are now falling, Carlos Viana, a senator who is running for the Minas governorship with Bolsonaro’s party, admitted that it was “a big challenge” to promote the improving outlook, as many lower-income families are yet to feel the benefits.

He hopes the reluctance of some Mineiros to disclose political views will play to Bolsonaro’s advantage. “The Brazilian voter will only decide 15 days before the election,” he added. “That’s even stronger in Minas”.

Back in Granja de Freitas, 27-year-old Lucas Henrique Crepalde de Sousa, who fixes computers and works as a driver for a ride-hailing app on weekends, is a rare voice in favour of the president, calling him a “good person” whose policies have improved Brazil.

“I’m going to vote for Bolsonaro,” he said. “But I won’t tell anyone around here.”