Brazil set to return leftist president

THEY lit fireworks, danced the samba and waved flags emblazoned with the red star, but Brazil’s left scored only a partial victory in a presidential race that now goes to a second round.

Unable to win a weekend election outright, former labour boss Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva is headed for an October 27 showdown with the second-place finisher, government-backed candidate Jose Serra.

“Let us go and wage the fight,” said Jose Geonino, one of Silva’s closest aides, as he rallied more than 1,000 cheering supporters of the leftist Workers Party candidate after Sunday’s ballot. "I call for the vote of all who want to change Brazil.”