By Fernando Cardoso
SAO PAULO, Oct 1 (Reuters) - Organizers scrapped a final high-profile debate in Brazil's presidential election on Thursday after both frontrunners, leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and right-wing Senator Flavio Bolsonaro, opted to skip the event.
Flavio, the eldest son of former President Jair Bolsonaro, initially planned to attend the debate on TV Globo, the last campaign fixture before Sunday's election, but he pulled out just hours before the event after Lula — who
has skipped all debates this year — declined to attend.
"My only opponent in this campaign is Lula," Flavio said this week. "He's the one I want to debate."
TV Globo canceled the debate after receiving last-minute court rulings that altered previously agreed debate rules, including restrictions on referring to absent candidates, the network said in a statement.
The cancellation shows the declining role of televised debates in Brazilian politics, once a hallmark of the country's democracy after decades of military dictatorship, and deprives voters of a clash over policy just days before the first-round vote.
Lula, who has led every major poll for Sunday's first-round vote, has avoided sharing the stage with a field dominated by right-wing candidates who could concentrate their attacks on him as he sets his sights on a likely runoff against Bolsonaro.
"I don't go to debates to listen to nonsense. If the debate isn't helpful to the public, why should I go just to respond to trash talk?" Lula said in July.
Lula, running for president for the seventh time, also declined to participate in the last debate before the first round of his 2006 reelection campaign, a decision that drew widespread criticism at the time.
Rivals have accused him of dodging scrutiny over his administration.
Four right-of-center candidates — author-psychiatrist Augusto Cury, former Goias Governor Ronaldo Caiado, former Minas Gerais Governor Romeu Zema and Renan Santos — had been expected to take part in the debate on TV Globo, Brazil's largest free-to-air broadcaster.
Other networks canceled two other debates after both declined to attend. On Thursday, Lula, who is seeking an unprecedented fourth non-consecutive term, is set to appear on a podcast at the same time as the TV Globo debate was scheduled.
A Datafolha poll on Thursday showed Lula with 42% support for the first round and Bolsonaro with 38%. In a simulated runoff scenario, the president would take 48% of the vote against the senator's 45%.
(Reporting by Fernando Cardoso; Editing by Gabriel Araujo, Rosalba O'Brien and William Mallard)
