Brazil's main presidential candidates traded accusations of corruption in their last debate before Sunday's election, with little discussion of proposals to govern the South American country.
The incumbent far-right president Jair Bolsonaro called his leftist rival, former president Luiz Inacio Lula da SilvaLula da Silva, the boss of a criminal gang that ran a kleptocracy during his two-term presidency from 2003 to 2010.
Lula, who has a comfortable double-digit lead heading into the first round of voting, called Bolsonaro a shameless liar whose government covered up graft in the purchase of vaccines during the COVID 19 epidemic that killed more than 680,000 Brazilians.
The Centrist candidate Simone Tebet, of the Brazilian Democratic Movement party MDB, scolded both men for exchanging personal attacks instead of focusing on proposals to solve high unemployment and rising hunger.
Tebet said she would reverse Bolsonaro's environmental policies that let deforestation surge in the Amazon.
She said of Bolsonaro's isolation due to his failure to protect the rainforest, let's stop being an international pariah.
Lula vowed to crack down on illegal mining in the forest during the debate run by TV Globo in Rio de Janeiro.
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If elected, Lula said he would lift the 100 years of secrecy Bolsonaro declared on his health ministry's negotiations of COVID 19 vaccines and investigations into alleged financial misdeeds by the president's sons to see what he is hiding. Major opinion polls show Lula with a lead of about 10 -- 15 percentage points over Bolsonaro ahead of the first round of voting.
Pollster Datafolha said Lula has 50 percent of the valid votes, including blank and null ballots, and could win the election outright on Sunday, avoiding a second round runoff.
If a second round runoff is needed, it will be on October 30.