Brazilian presidential candidate Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s lead in the polls over President Jair Bolsonaro has narrowed to less than 5 percentage points, according to a new opinion poll released Thursday by AtlasIntel.
In its first poll since the first round of elections on Oct. 2, AtlasIntel found that 51.1% of voters were in favor of Lula and 46.5% favor Bolsonaro.
Excluding undecided and null votes, Lula has 52.4% support and Bolsonaro 47.6%.
During the polarized first round and with a total of nine candidates, former President Lula won 48% of the vote to Bolsonaro’s 43%, setting the stage for a surprisingly complex runoff on October 30.
“The outlook of this poll shows a more difficult struggle for Lula than it seemed at first, with a certain advantage that will be difficult to overcome,” said Andrei Roman, executive director of AtlasIntel.
AtlasIntel was one of several pollsters criticized for underestimating bolsonaro’s support in the first round, though it came closer than several more traditional polling firms.
Bolsonaro needs to get an additional 6 million votes to win re-election, while Lula requires 1.2 million to be elected in what would be a third term for the leftist leader, who held office between 2003 and 2010.
AtlasIntel interviewed 4,500 voters across the country who were randomly selected via the Internet between October 8 and 12. The survey has a margin of error of +-1 percentage point.
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