Brazil's far-right wave led by Jair Bolsonaro, who scored a huge win in the first round of the presidential election, also gave a boost to candidates for Congress with military ties.

 

Twenty-two current or former military servicemembers were elected Sunday to the 513-strong Chamber of Deputies -- more than double the 10 serving in the outgoing lower house, according to vote tallies published by state-run Agencia Brasil.

 

Two candidates with army ties were also elected to Brazil's Senate.

 

One of them was Sergio Olimpio Gomes -- better known as Major Olimpio, a member of Bolsonaro's ultra-conservative Social Liberal Party who got more than nine million votes in the southeastern state of Sao Paulo, the richest and most populated state in the country.

 

The party increased its overall share of seats in the Chamber of Deputies from eight to 52.

 

And in 27 state legislatures, Agencia Brasil counted more than 60 newly elected members with military ties.

 

"This (result) proves that today, people are less resistant to the military," a close advisor to Bolsonaro, reserve general Augusto Heleno Ribeiro Pereira, told daily newspaper Folha de S. Paulo.

 

"The fact that we're further away from the military regime means prejudices are diminished," added the general, who served from 2004 to 2005 as the commander of the UN mission in Haiti.

 

Bolsonaro, a former army captain who doesn't hide his admiration for the 1964-1985 military dictatorship, vowed to appoint several generals to his government if elected.

 

He will face leftist Fernando Haddad in a presidential run-off on October 28 after winning 46 percent of the vote to Haddad's 29 percent in the first round.