For nearly five hours, two of Brazil’s most powerful men have faced each other in a Curitiba courtroom in a dramatic legal encounter that has divided the country and left Brazilians tense over what could happen next.

On one side was Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, known simply as Lula – the most popular president in Brazilian history. He was being questioned by Sérgio Moro, a crusading federal judge who has become a national hero for jailing the rich and powerful in a gargantuan corruption scandal.

Lula is accused of benefiting from the plot, in which billions of dollars were siphoned off fat contracts at the state-run oil company Petrobras. If he is found guilty and jailed, it would mark an extraordinary comedown for a man who transformed Brazil during his eight-year presidency.

Amid fears of violent protests, security was increased around the courtroom in the southern city of Curitiba, where the hearing – which is closed to the press – is taking place. Thousands of red-shirted Lula supporters descended on the city, along with Dilma Rousseff, his successor as president for the leftist Workers’ party, who was impeached last year.

After the hearing, Lula and Rousseff gave impassioned speeches to a large crowd of supporters in a Curitiba square, who sang his name and chanted: “Lula, warrior of the Brazilian people.”

In his speech, Lula attacked what he said was bias in the Brazilian media against him and thanked supporters who had travelled from different parts of Brazil.

“Never in the story of Brazil was someone was so persecuted and massacred as I am being in the last years,” he said.

Paulo Baía, a political scientist at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, said the trial had become politicised by both Lula and Moro. “There is a climate of tension,” he said. But in recording a video asking supporters of the corruption investigation not to go to Curitiba to demonstrate, Moro had also politicised the trial, Baía said.

“It has elevated the temperature of the testimony into a big political act,” he said.

Lula – who waved a Brazilian flag on the way into court – faces a barrage of legal cases. Wednesday’s hearing focused on a seaside apartment which prosecutors allege was renovated and then given to him by OAS, a company embroiled in the scandal, which also transported and stored his presidential archive.

Lula is accused of benefitting to the tune of 3.7m reais (£910,000), but the prosecution alleges OAS was settling a bigger 88m reais (£21m) graft bill with the Workers’ party he co-founded, in return for big oil refinery contracts.

Lula denies the charges, which his supporters say are part of a politically motivated legal war to stop him from winning a third presidential election in 2018. Early polls have put Lula as a clear winner in the contest – but if he were found guilty and his conviction upheld by a higher court, he would be unable to run. Following today’s hearing, the prosecution and defence will present their final arguments before a ruling.

Lula’s lawyer Cristiano Martins also criticised the proceedings immediately after they ended. “What we have witnessed today in a Brazilian court room was a politically motivated attack. The hearing was a farce. Zero evidence was produced by the prosecutors whilst Lula and his legal team have produced overwhelming evidence of his innocence today,” he said in a statement.

Throughout the day, hashtags in support of both Lula and Moro trended heavily in Brazil. One of the most popular, #MoroOrgulhoBrasileiro (#MoroBrazilianPride), was shared by a Brazilian tweeting as Cleide Viana. “We don’t need another hero, we have Dr Moro,” she posted.



The former president’s supporters, meanwhile used the hashtag #MoroPersegueLula – or MoroPersecutesLula.

Thousands of Lula supporters gathered in Curitiba. Paulo D’Avila, 67, a retired tax officer in a red T-shirt, travelled two and a half hours to support the former president. He said Moro was the puppet of darker forces that masterminded the controversial impeachment of Rousseff in 2016 – a process she and Lula describe as a coup.

“He is in service of financial capital,” D’Avila said. “Like a good part of Brazilians, I am in the struggle against this gang that has taken over Brazil.”