The World Cup kicks off in less than two months when the hosts, Brazil, take on Croatia in São Paulo on June 12. That is assuming, of course, the stadium is ready – it is still under construction. Either way, it looks as though football’s premier competition will decide more than which is the finest footballing nation in the world. It may well have a critical bearing on Brazil’s presidential elections, whose first round is set for October 5.
In the past three months Dilma Rousseff, the incumbent, has slipped dramatically in the opinion polls from 47 to 36 per cent. Every day the headlines serve up another plate of woe: the latest involves a two-pronged attack launched by the opposition against Petrobras, the country’s largest company and one particularly dear to the president.
The partially state-owned oil company stands accused of having miscalculated over an investment in a Texas refinery. According to testimony before the senate by Maria das Graças Foster, the company’s boss, it was “a bad business deal” – although she added that the group did not overpay for the refinery to the extent alleged by critics, and an internal investigation found no wrongdoing by Petrobras employees. When the deal was struck, the Petrobras chairman was none other than Ms Rousseff herself.