IBOPE survey published October, 15: Bolsonaro has 59% of voting intentions, Hadddad 41% (% on valid votes). But the data that favors even more Bolsonaro is that of “refusal to vote” (rejeção): 47% of voters declare that they would never vote Haddad, against 35% who would never vote Bolsonaro.

So Haddad has very little margin of growth, even less than Bolsonaro, who could over-win the 2nd round.

Unless really sensational facts, these elections can already be filed: Bolsonaro will win.

As much as we can be surprised and worried about the probable election of a character like Bolsonaro, it will be the result of elections that were held in full respect of democracy. They are the demonstration of the full democratic process existing in Brazil: Bolsonaro is the outsider, without support from the establishment, a politician of little expression. Yet it will be voted by more than 50 million Brazilians.

Commenting on the outrage at the emergence of this fascist/populist “wave” in Brazil, the Washington Post wrote, rightly, that no one better than Brazilians can decide who should govern Brazil. Just as in the USA a president has been elected hostile by the so-called “strong powers”, the same can happen in Brazil.

Of course there is a substantial difference: the US has strong institutions that always guarantee the maintenance of democracy, Brazil is instead a young democracy, potentially more permeable to possible authoritarian drifts. Although the judiciary has recently confirmed its autonomy and authority, it is questionable what its ability to prevent any interference from an executive who does not properly present himself as a champion of respect for the Constitution.

I repeat here, paraphrasing, what I wrote at the time of the election of Donald Trump: “But what should we expect now? The election of Bolsonaro will not be the end of the world: in Brazil as in the USA, the sun will continue to rise every morning, we will continue to wake up to go to work, to do “business as usual”.

Just as the election of Trump has not caused the feared disasters, indeed the US economy goes with a fair wind, that of Bolsonaro will not bring Brazil to a new dictatorship, but all institutions and citizens will have to watch to prevent this it can take place.