Brazilians streamed to the polls today with frustration over falling wages and rising crime set to propel leftist Mr Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva into the presidency, ushering in a new era for Latin America's largest nation.
A former metalworker, Mr Lula is overwhelmingly expected to win. He has become a symbol of hope for slum dwellers and the middle class, both caught up in a vicious cycle of poverty and violence that improved little in President Fernando Henrique Cardoso's eight-year administration.
Rival candidate Mr Jose Serra, a former health minister backed by the centrist ruling coalition, was forecast to win between 36 to 38 per cent of votes while Mr Lula could gather as much as 64 percent.
Mr Lula shifted his left-wing Workers' Party's platform to the centre to win over conservative voters after he failed in his previous three bids to be president of the world's fourth largest democracy.
If victorious, he would be Brazil's first working-class president and the country's first elected leftist leader, showcasing Brazil's young democracy in what is only its fourth election since the end of a 1964-1985 military dictatorship.
A victory for Lula, who celebrates his 57th birthday on Sunday, would mark a dramatic shift for Brazil and a turning point in Latin American history, where leaders have generally been picked from a small wealthy elite or from the military.
About 10 per cent of the population controls 50 per cent of its wealth, much of which sprouts from the vast agricultural and mineral resources of a landmass larger than the continental United States.
But with unemployment at its highest level since early 2000, real wages falling and 50 million people living in poverty, Mr Cardoso was always in for a challenge to elect his chosen successor.