Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva knows the value of a down-to-earth metaphor. He talks about the folly of harvesting "green fruit", or how when his wife, Marisa, first became pregnant he had been "crazy" for the baby to arrive - but had to wait for the birth and a further 11 months for his young son to take his first steps.

Another time, in a speech outside a Mercedes-Benz factory in São Paulo, he draws inspiration from a recent victory by Corinthians, the soccer team both he and most of the 6,000 workers support. In a match against rivals Palmeiras, Corinthians conceded two early goals after an anxious start. "When the team started thinking a bit, we started to come back into the match and turned it round."