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Some hope is also involved.

(Reading time: 2 - 4 minutes)

October 28 will be a fateful day for Brazil. The huge country with the size of a continent has to choose between two candidates for the presidency in the run-off election. You couldn't be more different.

According to surveys, the left-wing candidate Fernando Haddad currently receives 43 percent of the votes. "That's not zero, but honestly: I don't see any chance of his victory," says André Müller Carioba, German-Brazilian and Chairman of the Advisory Board of the LIDE Deutschland business network.

"Haddad's PT party has become even more leftist than it already was. It insists on nationalizations, that would be poison for the economy", he says. In addition, Haddad had already worked in several political offices and failed to do so: neither in the office of Education Minister of the country nor as Mayor of Sao Paulo had he shown any particular commitment or achievement worth mentioning. "Many Brazilians and above all the inhabitants of Sao Paulo see it that way," says Müller Carioba. Although Haddad is the candidate of the poor population, he is also part of the party that has attracted attention through fraud scandals and the deep grip on state coffers. "The Brazilians are fed up with corruption, violence and a political caste that misuses the state as a self-service shop to increase its own prosperity," says Müller Carioba.

A new man is to take the lead. One that's not part of the system. Someone to clean up. One that promises security. This Donald Trump of Brazil is called Jair Bolsonaro and according to the latest polls receives about 57 percent of the votes. A political backbencher who wants to take action against political opponents with 'cleansing actions'. The torture publicly approved, the military dictatorship glorified and the contact with women and homosexuals catapulted back into the 18th century. "I am relatively sure that Bolsonaro will still win," says André Müller Carioba.

From the Brazilians' point of view, the candidate from the right-wing camp is supported above all by his announcement that the security situation in the country will be improved with a hard hand. "He who goes out at night plays with his life. People have had enough of it," says Müller Carioba, summing up the mood in Brazil. Bolsonaro has also declared war on corruption and announced the privatization of state-owned enterprises. "In Brazil, city councillors to presidents have reached into many pots, in all parties, at every level, always to fill their own pockets. Now the Bolsonaro comes from the social-liberal small party PSL and says: This must stop. That's why he's elected."

Memories of the military dictatorship of more than 30 years ago, with its arbitrariness and violence, are repressed. "It has also fallen into oblivion among the elderly. That's naive," says Müller Carioba. He hopes - and with him probably the majority of Bolsonaro's voters - that the right in the presidency will strike a moderate note. "In Brazil this is often the case - the candidates rattle their sabres to make you afraid. If they are then in charge, they are much better than feared."

What nourishes this hope is Bolsonaro's commitment to have no idea of economics and to appoint a minister of economics who is a recognized expert: Paulo Guedes. He belongs to the so-called Chicago-Boys, which stand for a liberal economic policy. "Bolsonaro would be a better choice for companies, the stock market and the currency," says Müller Carioba, who is also former president of BMW Do Brasil. He sees the national currency Real winning Bolsonaro at a rate of 3.80 to one euro. It currently stands at 4.24 Real. "The real should become stronger. This makes imports cheaper, helps in the fight against inflation and thus makes it possible to lower interest rates again in the future." Before the first ballot, one euro still cost five real. "There the tendency becomes already visible. But it would be better if the Real didn't win too much strength, otherwise Brazil's important exports would suffer too much," says Müller Carioba.

Around five o'clock in the morning on 29 October, Europe will know relatively certain what the new President's name will be and will have to adapt to it.

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