Brasil's Lula Won Olympics Bid, Now Must Win Against Rio's Crime.

BLOOMBERG/
"Brazil’s President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who as a boy sold peanuts on the street, beat the world’s two richest nations for the 2016 Olympic Games. Now, he must defeat Rio de Janeiro’s violent crime, which residents call the biggest cloud over their city’s postcard-perfect bid.
Lula will also have to push Rio, the sea-side city of Carnival and the 2007 Pan American games, to improve its transit system, renovate its crumbling airport and double its hotel space before it can host its largest international event ever.
“The security problem is very serious,” said Carlos Langoni, a former central bank president and finance chief of the organizing committee for the World Cup 2014, which Brazil will host. “The city’s transportation infrastructure also needs major work but the government is committed and will tackle these issues.”
Rio is one of the most violent cities in the world, according to a ranking by Web site RealClearWorld. Home to about 7 million people, it recorded 2,069 murders last year compared with 510 in Chicago, a city of 2.8 million and a finalist contender for the games. The police commit one in five of the murders, according to the United Nations high commissioner for Human Rights."