'Joan of Arc of subversion' on track to be the next president of Brazil

Once called the "Joan of Arc of subversion" and imprisoned and tortured by the military regime that long controlled the Latin giant, Dilma Rousseff, the Workers' Party candidate is now set to become its first female leader.

None of her subversive past was apparent as Ms Rousseff, 62, strode into a room full of Rio de Janeiro's top business brass this week, dressed in a smart pink suit and smiling to the flashing cameras.

"My objective is clear, Brazil has to turn from an emerging to a developed country. We must become a country made up of middle classes," she told her enthusiastic audience.

Polls put her 25 percentage points ahead of opposition Social Democrat rival Jos Serra, 68, the former governor of Sao Paulo state, making her an easy favourite to win the election in the first round by capturing more than half of the vote.

Ms Rousseff is riding high on the popularity of outgoing president Luiz Incio Lula da Silva, who is enjoying record approval rates of more than 80 per cent after nearly eight years in office and handpicked her as his successor.

Under Mr Lula, Brazil has enjoyed a booming economy - expected to grow 7 per cent this year despite the global economic downturn - accompanied by a historic drop in social inequality with the number of poor falling from 49.5 million in 2003 (28 per cent of the population) to 29 million (16 per cent) five years later, according to the private Getulio Vargas Foundation.

Mr Lula, who is ineligible to run for a third four-year term, insists Ms Rousseff played a crucial role in his government's success and calls his former chief of staff and energy minister the "mother of the PAC" in reference to the government's flagship infrastructure programme.

He has relentlessly worked the crowds alongside her in rallies across the country, even drawing fines for campaign irregularities in his attempt to shake some stardust onto his protegee who until a few months ago was trailing an equally dull Serra.

Key to this transformation is her team's slick TV advertisements, picturing her as Mr Lula's natural heir ("Lula is with her, so am I" repeats her campaign song). She has also acquired a more modern hairstyle, stopped wearing glasses and has even taken to dancing on stage, all to lessen her image as a stern technocrat.Privately known for being harsh with those working for her - a style that earned her the Thatcherite nickname The Iron Lady - she has lately spoken openly about her fight to overcome lymphatic cancer last year.

Crucially, she vows to maintain Mr Lula's market-friendly policies, keep inflation in check and reduce public debt while continuing to strengthen popular social projects directed to the poor, moves which are popular with most Brazilians

"Dilma will do better than Lula, as a woman she's more focused on details and has enough experience to do well," Sandra de Oliveira, a 24-year-old student, said in Rio de Janeiro.

"She's the best candidate and Lula will be with her, that's our best guarantee for the future," added Joao Silva, an IT consultant.

PROFILE

The daughter of a Bulgarian immigrant and a Brazilian schoolteacher, Dilma Rousseff was raised in an upper middle-class household in south-eastern Brazil.

In 1967, as a 19-year-old economics student, she joined an urban Marxist group fighting to overthrow Brazil's military dictatorship, helping lead this guerrilla organisation until she was captured in 1970. She spent three years in jail and was brutally tortured.

In 1986 she was chosen to be finance minister for the city of Porto Alegre and in 2000 joined the Workers' Party. She rose to the position of energy minister in Luiz Incio Lula da Silva's government and later become his chief of staff.