In the first round of voting in the Brazilian presidential election, Bolsonaro took first place, surpassing Lula... Confirmed to advance to finals

About 99% of votes were counted... Bolsonaro 47.3%, Lula 44.9%

(Mexico City = Yonhap News) Correspondent Song Kwang-ho = Right-wing Liberal Party (PL) candidate Flavio Bolsonaro surprisingly took first place in the first round of voting in the Brazilian presidential election held on the 4th (local time).

With a vote counting rate of 98.62%, candidate Bolsonaro took first place with 47.27% of the vote, beating President Luiz Inacio Lula Dasiva of the Workers' Party (PT), who received only 44.88%, and won a ticket to the runoff.

However, as he failed to receive a majority (more than 50%) of the votes, he faces another confrontation with President Lula in the runoff election to be held on the 25th. Under Brazilian election law, if no one receives a majority of votes in the first round, the top two candidates must hold a runoff election.

Candidate Bolsonaro was ahead from the beginning of the vote counting. This is because votes are counted first in urban areas such as Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, which are strong areas. Candidate Bolsonaro mainly received support from cities, while President Lula received support from rural areas.

However, contrary to various opinion polls showing that Lula would take first place, Bolsonaro's momentum did not wane until the mid to late stages.

Lula was ahead in most of the central and northwestern regions as well as the southeastern region, where the Liberal Party was traditionally strong. With the victory in most regions except the northeast, Lula's stronghold, the gap between Bolsonaro and Lula widened to 10 percentage points at one point.

Lula pursued persistently until the last minute, including recapturing the northwestern region, but was defeated by Bolsonaro without even gaining a single lead.