“Never has an electoral campaign been, in Brazil, of such a low level”, this is what Merval Pereira, one of the great editorial writers of the newspaper O Globo, writes. It’s true, the level of this end of the campaign is appalling. The Bolsonaro team call Lula a “satanist” and of “taken from justice”. The opposing camp responds by calling Jair Bolsonaro a “pedophile” and of “cannibal”. And this is only a sample: we also hear the words “dictator”, “psychopath” and of course “corrupt” on both sides.
After six months of campaigning, there is almost no longer any debate on the substance, the proposals pass into the background even though they are quite different. What dominates is the personal animosity between the two men, and the Brazilians are especially invited to choose between two characters, two personalities that everything opposes. So personal attacks have become the rule. They do not come out of nowhere: Lula is obviously attacked because of his past disputes with the law, even if he has been cleared. Jair Bolsonaro is called a pedophile because of his admittedly very ambiguous remarks about his attraction to Venezuelan minors.
The corollary is a flood of false information using of course the social networks which are the tool of misinformation par excellence. Used by 80% of the 215 million Brazilians. In this game of misinformation, Jair Bolsonaro wins hands down. The Electoral Court, the most official body, has even just opened an investigation against “the disinformation ecosystem” set up by the far-right president. And yesterday, Lula, with his scratchy voiceposted a video on the subject: “My friendssaid Lula, help you spot and fight fake news, my adversary has set up a real industry of lies”. The left-wing candidate even had to deny, very seriously, “signing a pact with the Devil”. The electoral court therefore granted 184 rights of reply to Lula in view of the false accusations of his opponent. In the other direction, Jair Bolsonaro is granted 14 rights of reply, 13 times less.
So far, the polls still give Lula in the lead with 4 to 8 points ahead according to the institutes. Between 52 and 54% of the votes for the former president on the left. But in the first round, we remember, the far-right outgoing president had done, with 43%, much better than the institutes expected. Jair Bolsonaro is therefore campaigning vigorously, in particular in the Northeast, a region rather won over to Lula. For example, Tuesday evening October 25, he was in Barreiras, not far from Salvador de Bahia. And he posed, during his speech as a defender of the family. Jair Bolsonaro is betting on the last televised debate, Friday evening October 28 on O Globo, to overtake his competitor on the wire.