Brazil’s Lula and Bolsonaro statistically tied in presidential race -poll
5:58 pm Wednesday, October 19th, 2022
SAO PAULO (Reuters) -Brazil’s presidential race has narrowed to a 4-percentage-point gap between leftist front-runner Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and far-right incumbent President Jair Bolsonaro, and they are now statistically tied, according to a poll published on Wednesday.
Datafolha said Lula now has 49% of voter support against 45% for Bolsonaro less than two weeks from the second-round runoff on Oct. 30, compared to 49% and 44% respectively in the previous poll five days ago.
The poll has a margin of error of 2 percentage points up or down, meaning both could mathematically be tied at 47%.
The survey also showed that 94% of Brazilian voters have already decided on who they will vote for, leaving the candidates scrambling for the remaining 6%.
It was the first Datafolha survey since the presidential debate on Sunday, where Bolsonaro attacked corruption scandals under Lula’s Workers Party, which governed from 2003 to 2016.
Datafolha interviewed 2,912 voters between Oct. 17-19.
(Reporting by Peter Frontini and Carolina PuliceEditing by Chris Reese and Sandra Maler)
