Brazil is on tenterhooks as voters are due to decide in the coming hours if the world's fourth-largest democracy should continue to be led by the far-right incumbent or whether to vote a left-wing former president back in.

A Brazilian judge has overturned an order for the immediate release of ex-President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, better known as "Lula".

A Brazilian appeals court Wednesday upheld ex-president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's conviction for corruption, dealing a body blow to his hopes of running for re-election this year.

The suspended Brazilian President, Dilma Rousseff, says she will not attend the opening ceremony of the Rio Olympics because she does not want to take a secondary position in the Maracana stadium.

Jose Dirceu, a top power broker in the leftist Workers Party that governed Brazil f-rom 2003 until last week