This is the second in a three-part series on Roraima in the context of Brazil’s general elections. The project was supported by the Pulitzer Center’s Rainforest Journalism Fund.
Boa Vista, Brazil – Standing centre-stage at a campaign event, Antonio Denarium closes his eyes and holds his hands open in prayer. Below him in the crowd, dozens of others perform the same gesture, commonly associated with Brazil’s evangelical Christian community.
Courting the religious vote is a shrewd move for any politician here in Roraima, a conservative corner of Brazil’s Amazon on the border with Venezuela and Guyana.
Seeking re-election as state governor, Denarium is an outspoken supporter of Brazil’s far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro, who is popular among evangelical voters and has more support in Roraima than in any other state.
Speaking to Al Jazeera after the event, Denarium paints a rosy picture of the embattled president’s chances of winning a second term: “President Bolsonaro will be re-elected. He is our partner, he is our friend, and he will help us in the reconstruction of Brazil and the state of Roraima.”
Nationwide polls show Bolsonaro trailing left-wing former President Luiz Inacio “Lula” da Silva by a double-digit margin ahead of Sunday’s election. Some analysts have even cautiously upped the odds of Lula winning more than 50 percent of the vote, thus avoiding a runoff – although a second round still appears likely.
Yet, here in Roraima, Bolsonaro is firmly in the lead, with 62 percent support to Lula’s 18 percent, according to polls by Ipec. The president’s hardline views on street crime and religious conservatism, along with his laissez-faire approach to economic and environmental regulation, resonate in many parts of Brazil, and especially in frontier, agricultural or extraction-driven states, such as Roraima.
“Almost all candidates here in Roraima are surfing the last waves of Bolsonaro,” political scientist Paulo Racoski, who teaches at the Federal Institute of Roraima, told Al Jazeera.
‘Apple of my eye’
In the state race, Denarium leads his rival, Teresa Surita, the former mayor of the state capital Boa Vista, by more than 10 percentage points. Denarium was elected to office in 2018, the same year that Bolsonaro won in Roraima by an overwhelming margin, taking more than 70 percent of the vote. Bolsonaro has…