Brazil election: Lula leads Bolsonaro in polls as country votes in tense presidential contest
Brazilians cast their votes on Sunday in the first round of their country's most polarised election in decades, with leftist Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva expected to beat far-right incumbent Jair Bolsonaro.
Most polls have shown Lula with a solid lead for months, but Bolsonaro has signaled he may refuse to accept defeat, stoking fears of institutional crisis or post-election violence.
A message projected on Rio de Janeiro's Christ the Redeemer statue ahead of the vote read: "Peace in the Elections".
"It's an important day for me," Lula said as he voted in São Bernardo do Campo. "Four years ago I couldn't vote because I was the victim of a lie ... I want to try to help my country to return to normal."
Lula was jailed during the last election, serving a conviction for corruption that he says was politically motivated. It was later overturned by the Supreme Court, allowing him to face off against his fierce rival Bolsonaro in this year's vote.
Bolsonaro voted in Rio, and said he expected to win the election in Sunday's first round, despite his poor showing in polls.
"If we have clean elections, we will win today with at least 60% of the votes," the incumbent president said in a video posted on his social media before voting.
If Lula wins more than 50% of valid votes, which several pollsters show within reach, that would clinch an outright victory, foregoing a second-round vote. Otherwise the two finishers go to a run-off on October 30.
Most opinion surveys favour Lula, who was president from 2003 to 2010, by 10-15 percentage points. The last Datafolha survey published on Saturday gave him a 50% to 36% advantage among those who intended to vote. It interviewed 12,800 people, with a margin of error of two percentage points.
A winner
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