Which Lula will rule Brazil?

Salvador When Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva climbs onto the truck with the huge speakers on Avenida Paulista late on Sunday evening after his narrow election victory, many of the assembled supporters ask themselves: Will the 77-year-old be able to speak at all after the nerve-wracking election campaign of the past few months? Isn’t he tired?

Hours earlier, Brazil had experienced an election thriller like it hadn’t seen in a long time. Lula only narrowly won in the last straight of the counts with around two million votes against incumbent Jair Bolsonaro.

He was able to unite a total of 50.9 percent of the votes. And he did something historic: Lula is now the first president of Brazil since the end of the dictatorship in 1985 to hold office for the third time.