Brazil election: Far-right Jair Bolsonaro wins first round
The far-right candidate, Jair Bolsonaro, has won the first round of Brazil’s presidential election.
He will face the left-wing Workers’ Party candidate, Fernando Haddad, in the second round on 28 October after he failed to win the 50% of valid votes needed to win outright.
With almost all the votes counted, Mr. Bolsonaro had 46% and Mr. Haddad 29%.
Opinion polls conducted before the election predicted that in a second round the two candidates would be tied.
Mr. Bolsonaro said that he was certain that if there had not been “problems” with the electronic voting system used in Brazil, he would have won outright.
“I am certain that if this hadn’t happened, we would have known the name of the president of the republic tonight.”
He did not specify what he thought those “problems” were.
Brazil’s electoral authorities have said the vote went ahead peacefully and without any major problems.
Brazilians will have to choose between two very different candidates on 28 October.
Mr. Bolsonaro, a Catholic, won the support of many evangelical Christians by saying he would defend traditional family values. He has also won over many Brazilians who think his law-and-order stance will make Brazil safer.
On the eve of Sunday’s vote, he said that is government would hand down the tough punishments offenders deserved. He is also in favour of relaxing gun ownership laws and has spoken of torture as a legitimate practice. He also wants to restore the death penalty.
In his victory speech, broadcast live on Facebook and uploaded onto Twitter, he said that were two paths Brazilians could follow.
“[There is] the path of prosperity, liberty. family, on God’s side… and the other one is that of Venezuela,” he said referring to Brazil’s socialist-led neighbour, a country mired in a deep economic and political crisis which has driven more than two million people to leave.
Mr. Haddad has portrayed himself as a trusted candidate for those who baulk at Mr. Bolsonaro’s style and rhetoric.
Speaking after he had made it into the second round, he said that he and the Workers’ Party would “only use arguments, we don’t use any guns.”
Referring to Mr. Bolsonaro’s lead he said that he felt “challenged by the results, which alerts us to the risks Brazilian democracy is facing.
“We need to approach this with a sense of responsibility. We want to unite the democrats of this country, to reduce inequality and to achieve social justice,” he told his cheering supporters.
Limousine crash leaves 20 dead in New York state
Twenty people have been killed in a crash involving a stretch limousine taking people to a party in the US state of New York, police say.
All 18 people in the limousine died along with two pedestrians in the incident on Saturday afternoon in the town of Schoharie, police confirmed.
Witnesses described seeing the SUV-style limousine shoot across a junction, hit another car, and then plough into people in a shop car park.
The cause of the crash is unclear.
The victims have not yet been officially named but the New York Times reported that they included four sisters and at least two pairs of newlyweds. All those killed were adults, police said.
Early reports suggested the car had been taking the group to a wedding reception but later reports said they were travelling to a birthday party.
State police said on Sunday that the passengers in the limousine, described as a 2001 Ford Excursion, would not have been required to wear seatbelts.
The driver was also killed in the crash, they said.
A reporter for local news site Spectrum News, tweeted images and footage from the scene of the incident, which took place near a store and cafe on routes 30 and 30A in Schoharie County.
Eyewitnesses said that a number of people entering and leaving the store were hit in Saturday’s incident, local media report.
“I heard this loud bang, I saw a lot of people here at the Apple Barrel [store and cafe] out in the parking lot. Then I heard screaming,” said Bridey Finnagen, who lives nearby.
New York State Police Cpt Richard O’Brien said on Sunday that the investigation was still in its early stages, adding that several separate police units were involved, including an identification unit and a drone team.
The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) tweeted that it was also sending a team of investigators to the site of the crash.
NTSB chairman Robert Sumwalt later told a press conference that it was “one of the biggest losses of life we’ve seen”, adding that it was the most deadly transportation accident since 2009.
