Sawt Falasteen - Hardline general vs pragmatic centrist: Brazil's VP duel

Here is a look at the running mates playing wingman to far-right incumbent Jair Bolsonaro and leftist challenger Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva in Sunday's divisive runoff election.

- Faithful soldier -

Like in the 2018 campaign that brought him to power, Bolsonaro, an ex-army captain who has cultivated close ties with the armed forces, tapped a military man as his running mate: General Walter Braga Netto.

But unlike current VP Hamilton Mourao, who has differed with his boss on policy -- sometimes publicly -- Braga Netto is seen as a hardline Bolsonaro supporter.

The 65-year-old army reserve general has held top jobs in Bolsonaro's administration, serving first as chief of staff, then defense minister.

In the former post, he notably oversaw the government's response to Covid-19 -- slammed as disastrous by critics, after the pandemic claimed more than 680,000 lives in Brazil, second only to the United States.

Born in the southeastern city of Belo Horizonte, capital of the key battleground state of Minas Gerais, Braga Netto became a general in 2009 and was named security chief when Brazil hosted the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.

Two years later, then-president Michel Temer ordered the military to take charge of security in Rio state amid a surge of violent crime -- tapping Braga Netto to lead the operation.

The intervention, which lasted almost a year, produced mixed results: some violent crime statistics receded, but killings by police officers rose sharply.

Braga Netto triggered controversy in March 2021, just after Bolsonaro named him defense minister, when he said the 1964 coup that installed more than two decades of military dictatorship in Brazil should be "celebrated" for "pacifying" the country.

Clean-cut and gruff, he is running in his first election.

- Big-tent bet -

Ex-president Lula has meanwhile tapped a one-time enemy as his running mate: centrist veteran Geraldo Alckmin.

The business-friendly one-time-candidate is Lula's bet to win over voters wary of Bolsonaro's warnings that his Workers' Party represents "communism."

The two are not exactly an obvious match: Alckmin ran against then-president Lula in Brazil's 2006 election, losing in the runoff.

But they say they have teamed up to defeat a common enemy in Bolsonaro.

"People might think it's strange," Alckmin said in March.

"I ran against Lula in 2006. But we never put the very issue of democracy at risk."

Alckmin rose to prominence as governor of Sao Paulo, Brazil's biggest and wealthiest state, in the 2000s and 2010s.

Known as a good administrator but a boring politician, the mild-mannered 69-year-old earned a reputation as a solid managerial type well-liked by the business and financial sectors.

But he had fallen into political oblivion, winning less than five percent of the vote in the first round of the 2018 presidential race, which brought Bolsonaro to power.

Born in Pindamonhangaba, a small city outside Sao Paulo, Alckmin grew up in a devout Catholic family.

He was a city councilman and mayor before winning a seat in Congress and eventually the governorship.

There appears to be little risk the charismatic Lula will be overshadowed by him.

Alckmin's nickname is "xuxu popsicle" -- a reference to chayote, a bland vegetable common in Brazil.

He has turned it into a joke on the campaign trail, quipping that "xuxu" with "lula" -- the ex-president's name means "squid" -- is now a favorite national dish.

N.Shalabi--SF-PST