After losing in the first round, Lula da Silva pulled off a historic comeback to be re-elected president of Brazil in the second round. Back in the Palácio do Planalto, which he had never left, the leader of the Workers' Party (PT) defied unfavourable precedent: since 1989, the year when Brazil returned to direct presidential elections and introduced the two-round system**,** no candidate trailing after the first round had ever gone on to win the second. I have always thought that God has been very generous to me, because there are so many people better prepared than I am, so many people with more diplomas than I have, so many people who have read more books than I have, so many people who have studied more than I have," he said in his victory speech, his fourth after a presidential election.
It was a first for Lula, too. In 1989, he finished 13.3 points behind his rival Fernando Collor de Mello in the first round and failed to close the gap in the second. From factory worker to trade unionist, from trade unionist to politician, from politician to president of Brazil.
Nothing has ever seemed impossible for Lula, who once again showed with this election that adversity is not always insurmountable. "I want to tell you that I am enormously proud. First, because I am the only president of the Republic, a metalworker without a university degree, elected four times, democratically, to call for peace," he told the crowd.
Lula, who turns 81 on Tuesday, promised "the best term" in Brazilian history. "The day after tomorrow, on the 27th, I will turn 81. And I want to make a pledge in front of the press and in front of you.
I am going to deliver the best term any president has ever served in the history of this country," he vowed. The seventh child of illiterate farmer parents, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva was born on 27 October 1945 in the Brazilian city of Garanhuns, in the north-eastern state of Pernambuco. He was only seven when he moved with his family to São Paulo, and 14 when he was admitted to a technical course in metalworking.
Before that, he had already worked as a street vendor, shoeshine boy, and dye-shop assistant. He went on to become a metalworker, a profession he later defended as a trade unionist. "Lula" began as a nickname and was later officially incorporated into his name – he is the epitome of the worker who becomes a politician: it was as a union leader and organiser of metalworkers' strikes in the São Paulo region, during the military dictatorship, that he made his name.
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