Lula’s to-do list Poverty, housing and the Amazon are at the top

While many Brazilians will have woken up with a hangover after celebrating the defeat of Jair Bolsonaro, president-elect Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva will soon have his own headaches to deal with. He takes power on 1 January 2023 and will be charged with rebuilding a nation that has been left damaged and bitterly divided after four years of Bolsonaro's far-right policies.

- Andrew Downie

The challenges are immense: 33 million Brazilians face acute hunger and 100 million live in poverty, the highest numbers in years. Bolsonaro's policies, particularly in the Amazon, have led to Brazil becoming an international pariah.

Lula addressed these and myriad other issues in his victory speech but made it clear his first priority was the one that has accompanied him throughout his long political career: improving the lot of Brazil's poor.

"We can't accept it as normal that in this country millions of men, women and children don't have enough to eat," he told an adoring crowd. "If we are the world's third biggest producer of food ... we have the duty to guarantee that every Brazilian can eat breakfast, lunch and dinner every day." The speech was a more emotive version of a letter he wrote to the Brazilian people last week outlining his priorities. The letter is filled with ambitious proposals, including equal pay for men and women, clearing all waiting lists for surgeries and medical exams, and getting every infant a place in creche.

The plan was issued without any clear details or costings, but Lula is betting that voters will trust he can repeat his feats from almost 12 years ago when he left power with approval ratings above 80%.