Lula’s fall prompts scramble for substitute among Brazil’s left

Bloomberg

With diminished odds that Brazil’s Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva will run for the presidency after an appeals court upheld his corruption conviction, a host of left-wing candidates are already trying to move in on his patch.
At least half a dozen leftist parties with representatives in Congress are ready to jump into the race as Lula’s candidacy looks set to be banned. That’s double the number in the 2014 race.
Even the Communist Party of Brazil, or PCdoB, which has never launched its own presidential candidate before and has always backed Lula since the country’s first free elections in 1989, says its time has come.
“My candidacy emerged out of the scenario of uncertainty surrounding Lula,” Manuela D’Avila, a state legislator, PCdoB presidential hopeful and one of the few women running, told Bloomberg news. “Our obligation is to debate the way out of the crisis, the recovery of growth and social policies.”
With over one third of voter intentions — nearly twice that of the runner-up — Lula’s absence would leave a void on the left of the political spectrum in Latin America’s largest nation.
Yet early public opinion polls show no single challenger would inherit Lula’s political capital, which is still significant despite several years of scandal and recession under his Workers’ Party. “It strengthens the chance of a fragmented left,” said Rafael Cortez, a political analyst at Tendencias Consulting firm.