Cardoso manages to keep 'shorter-than-expected' advantage - With
roughly half the ballots counted, President Fernando Henrique Cardoso was
re-elected Sunday in Brazil with a support of 21,047,768 votes (50.18% of the
total). His main opponent, left-winger Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) had
14,730,939 votes (35.12%), followed by Ciro Gomes (PPS), with 4,733,877
votes (11.29%), and Enéas Carneiro (Prona), with 936,539 votes (2.23%).
The difference between Cardoso and Lula is smaller than that estimated by an
Ibope-Globo TV-O Estado de S.Paulo poll, which gave the Brazilian President
an advantage of 56%. According to Datafolha, Cardoso received most of the
votes in at least six of the nine largest Brazilian electorate areas: So Paulo, Minas
Gerais, Bahia, Paraná, Pernambuco and Santa Catarina. In the states of Rio de
Janeiro, Rio Grande do Sul and Ceará, Cardoso and Lula were expected to
end up technically tied.
The election was carried out having as background an internal and external crisis
which represents a much more complex challenge than that imposed by high
inflation rates by the time the Real Plan was released, four years ago. Once his
re-election is confirmed, Cardoso will have to seek in Congress this week
support for the fiscal adjustment required to fight the effects of the international
turmoil affecting stock exchanges worldwide. (O Estado de S. Paulo/ Jornal da
Tarde/ Folha de S.Paulo/ Gazeta Mercantil)
Lula concedes defeat and calls Cardoso a "slaughterer" - Facing a third
defeat in a row in the dispute for Presidency, leftist candidate Luiz Inácio Lula
da Silva (PT) avoided making comments on his own political future yesterday.
Earlier on Sunday, Lula called Cardoso the Brazilians' "slaughterer". "I find it
incomprehensible that the victims vote on their slaughterer", he said. Even before
the first previews were announced, the left-winger showed signs of defeat. "I
would be a greater asset for Brazil than the current President". Despite of that,
Lula predicted that the PT would "continue to be the most important party in the
country" and added that this time around the leftist parties would expand in
Congress and state governorships. (O Estado de S. Paulo/ Jornal da Tarde/
Folha de S.Paulo)
São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro to have run-off elections - São Paulo
Governor Mário Covas (PSDB) and leftist candidate Marta Suplicy (PT) are
disputing ballot by ballot for the chance to dispute a second-round vote with
PPB candidate and former Mayor Paulo Maluf, which leads the election with
31.28% of the ballots. With 75.43% of the votes counted, Marta, with 24.19%,
has left Covas lagging behind, with 23.27%. Francisco Rossi (PDT), who
shared the lead with Maluf during significant part of the electoral campaign, had
17.19% of the votes.
In Rio de Janeiro, Anthony Garotinho (PDT) and César Maia (PFL) will define
the dispute in a run-off contest. With 99.31% of the ballots counted, Garotinho
received 46.89% of the votes, compared to 34.26% for Maia.
Also in Minas Gerais will a second round vote be necessary. Former President
Itamar Franco had 44.19% of the ballots, followed by current governor
Eduardo Azeredo, with 34.22%. (O Estado de S. Paulo/ Jornal da Tarde/
Folha de S.Paulo)
PSDB seen to lose seats in Chamber - The Chamber of Deputies general
secretary, Ubiratam Aguiar (PSDB-Ceará), admitted for the first time yesterday
that the PSDB, President Fernando Henrique Cardoso's party, would come out
of the general election with a worse-than-expected result in Congress, mainly in
the lower house. Aguiar estimates the PSDB should have some 80 deputies
elected, way down from an estimated total of 120 legislators. Aguiar
recommended Cardoso to seek an alliance with leftist parties as a way to
guarantee the passage of constitutional reforms in Congress. In the federal
capital Brasília, Deputy Arnaldo Madeira (PSDB-São Paulo), one of the
government's main mediators in Congress, classified Aguiar's idea as a
"tremendous nonsense". "That is a dream, unreal", Madeira criticized. (O Estado
de S. Paulo)
(By Sergio Caldas)
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