Brazil's leftist President Dilma Rousseff and center-right challenger Aecio Neves wrapped up their campaigns Saturday in the hardest-fought election in the country's recent history.
Brazilians vote Sunday in a run-off to choose the next leader of the world's seventh-largest economy, with the incumbent in the lead by six to eight points, according to the two top polling firms, after weeks of a statistical dead heat that fueled a vitriolic, no-holds-barred campaign.
Rousseff, 66, a former guerrilla who was jailed and tortured for fighting Brazil's 1964-1985 dictatorship, spent Saturday morning in her southern stronghold of Porto Alegre, where she was holding a march.
- Heated attacks -
Neves, the business-world favorite, was meanwhile in his native state of Minas Gerais in the southeast to pay a visit to the grave of his grandfather Tancredo, a leading figure in the democratic transition who was elected president in 1985 but died before taking office.
The 54-year-old senator was later due to visit a Catholic church in the town of Sao Joao del Rei and give a press conference.
Rousseff, who was elected Brazil's first woman president in 2010, taking the reins from her popular Workers' Party (PT) mentor, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, has had to fight tooth and nail to re-emerge as the front-runner.
In the build-up to the October 5 first-round vote, she had to fend off environmentalist Marina Silva, who took the polls by storm vowing to become the South American country's first "poor, black" president when she dramatically entered the race after her running mate Eduardo Campos died in a plane crash.
No sooner had the PT's electoral machine dispatched Silva -- who exited the first round with 21 percent of the vote, to Rousseff's 42 percent and Neves's 34 percent -- than the incumbent had to beat back Neves, who converted the momentum of his first-round comeback into a narrow lead.
- Social divisions -
With the candidates fighting for every vote in this sprawling country of 202 million people where voting is compulsory, the campaign took on a level of virulence not seen since the return to democracy.
Rousseff, who is known for her toughness, accused Neves of nepotism when he was governor of Minas Gerais, played up a media report that he once hit his then-girlfriend in public and suggested he was driving "drunk or on drugs" when he refused to take a breathalyzer during a 2011 traffic stop.
Neves fought back, accusing Rousseff of incompetently running the recession-hit economy and of "collusion" in a multi-billion-dollar kickback scandal at state oil giant Petrobras.
That charge returned to the fore on the eve of their final debate Friday when conservative news magazine Veja reported that Rousseff and Lula "knew everything" about the alleged embezzlement scheme, citing a shady money dealer accused in the case.
Neves opened the debate asking Rousseff about the report, which he called the culmination of "the most sordid campaign in history."
"Veja has presented no proof," Rousseff fired back, condemning the article as "slander and defamation" and repeating her vow to sue.
After the magazine's report, a small group of protesters invaded the publisher's headquarters, spray-painting "Veja lies" on the building and strewing trash at its gates, media reports said.
Brazil is divided along social lines heading into the election.
The poor, particularly in the impoverished northeast, are loyal to the PT thanks to landmark social programs that benefit 50 million people and have helped lift 40 million from poverty in the past 12 years.
The country's elites are meanwhile exasperated with interventionist economic policies such as petrol price controls and high taxes.
The battle is for the middle class in the industrialized southeast, the cradle of million-strong protests against corruption and poor public services that shook the country last year.
This demographic is torn between voters loyal to Lula for presiding over nearly a decade of prosperity and social gains from 2003 to 2011, and those frustrated with Rousseff's government.
Brazil’s leftist President Dilma Rousseff and center-right challenger Aecio Neves wrapped up their campaigns Saturday in the hardest-fought election in the country’s recent history.
Brazilians vote Sunday in a run-off to choose the next leader of the world’s seventh-largest economy, with the incumbent in the lead by six to eight points, according to the two top polling firms, after weeks of a statistical dead heat that fueled a vitriolic, no-holds-barred campaign.
Rousseff, 66, a former guerrilla who was jailed and tortured for fighting Brazil’s 1964-1985 dictatorship, spent Saturday morning in her southern stronghold of Porto Alegre, where she was holding a march.
– Heated attacks –
Neves, the business-world favorite, was meanwhile in his native state of Minas Gerais in the southeast to pay a visit to the grave of his grandfather Tancredo, a leading figure in the democratic transition who was elected president in 1985 but died before taking office.
The 54-year-old senator was later due to visit a Catholic church in the town of Sao Joao del Rei and give a press conference.
Rousseff, who was elected Brazil’s first woman president in 2010, taking the reins from her popular Workers’ Party (PT) mentor, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, has had to fight tooth and nail to re-emerge as the front-runner.
In the build-up to the October 5 first-round vote, she had to fend off environmentalist Marina Silva, who took the polls by storm vowing to become the South American country’s first “poor, black” president when she dramatically entered the race after her running mate Eduardo Campos died in a plane crash.
No sooner had the PT’s electoral machine dispatched Silva — who exited the first round with 21 percent of the vote, to Rousseff’s 42 percent and Neves’s 34 percent — than the incumbent had to beat back Neves, who converted the momentum of his first-round comeback into a narrow lead.
– Social divisions –
With the candidates fighting for every vote in this sprawling country of 202 million people where voting is compulsory, the campaign took on a level of virulence not seen since the return to democracy.
Rousseff, who is known for her toughness, accused Neves of nepotism when he was governor of Minas Gerais, played up a media report that he once hit his then-girlfriend in public and suggested he was driving “drunk or on drugs” when he refused to take a breathalyzer during a 2011 traffic stop.
Neves fought back, accusing Rousseff of incompetently running the recession-hit economy and of “collusion” in a multi-billion-dollar kickback scandal at state oil giant Petrobras.
That charge returned to the fore on the eve of their final debate Friday when conservative news magazine Veja reported that Rousseff and Lula “knew everything” about the alleged embezzlement scheme, citing a shady money dealer accused in the case.
Neves opened the debate asking Rousseff about the report, which he called the culmination of “the most sordid campaign in history.”
“Veja has presented no proof,” Rousseff fired back, condemning the article as “slander and defamation” and repeating her vow to sue.
After the magazine’s report, a small group of protesters invaded the publisher’s headquarters, spray-painting “Veja lies” on the building and strewing trash at its gates, media reports said.
Brazil is divided along social lines heading into the election.
The poor, particularly in the impoverished northeast, are loyal to the PT thanks to landmark social programs that benefit 50 million people and have helped lift 40 million from poverty in the past 12 years.
The country’s elites are meanwhile exasperated with interventionist economic policies such as petrol price controls and high taxes.
The battle is for the middle class in the industrialized southeast, the cradle of million-strong protests against corruption and poor public services that shook the country last year.
This demographic is torn between voters loyal to Lula for presiding over nearly a decade of prosperity and social gains from 2003 to 2011, and those frustrated with Rousseff’s government.
