São Paulo's mayoral race: The big beast IT IS lucky for José Serra that in Brazil a flip-flop is just a popular item of footwear. Otherwise that is what many might call his decision, made public on February 27th, to seek his party's nomination for mayor of São Paulo, after months of declaring that he had no interest in the job. His change of heart came just a week before a primary arranged by his Party of Brazilian Social Democracy (PSDB). Two of the four would-be candidates have now stepped aside to make way for Mr Serra, a former mayor, state governor and twice a losing presidential candidate. The vote has been delayed until March 25th to give him time to set out his stall. Though many party activists are furious at the casual treatment they have received, he is likely to win. São Paulo is Brazil's biggest municipality, with 11m residents, and the country's beating business heart. Its mayor matters. But the result of this election will now be especially important. It will affect the future of the PSDB, which at federal level is the main opposition to President Dilma Rousseff. It also has implications for the governing Workers" Party (PT) and the next presidential election, in 2014. When the current governor of São Paulo, Geraldo Alckmin, steps down in 2014, the state will have been in the PSDB's hands for 20 years. Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, Brazil's former president and the PT's powerbroker, has been plotting to end that hegemony. The plan was to win the mayoralty as a stepping stone to taking the state two years later. Lula arm-twisted the PT's local bigwigs into dropping their preferred mayoral candidate, Marta Suplicy, a former mayor popular with poor paulistanos but loathed by better-off ones. In her place Lula installed Fernando Haddad, a former education minister who is unobjectionable, unremarkable and in São Paulo almost unknown. They were close to sealing an alliance with the current mayor, Gilberto Kassab, that would have left the PSDB's candidate isolated. But Mr Kassab is a close friend of Mr Serra's. Now Mr Haddad must face a big beast, and probably without Mr Kassab's backing. Suddenly, the day when the PT takes the PSDB's stronghold looks further off. Mr Serra's previous stint as São Paulo's mayor ended prematurely. He stepped down after just 15 months to run for state governor, even though he had signed a pledge during the campaign to serve a full four-year term. This is his main electoral liability. Voters suspect that he still harbours presidential ambitions, and would cut short his mayoral term again. But a campaign spent swearing that this time is different will help his main rival for the PSDB's presidential nomination in 2014, Aécio Neves, a senator from Minas Gerais. Losing São Paulo would be a big blow for the PSDB. Mr Serra's return makes that less likely. Uniting around a single presidential candidate would also be a good idea - though Ms Rousseff, a popular and steady incumbent, will be hard to beat in 2014. Mr Serra won his party's nomination for president in 2010 by sheer force of will and because nobody could think of a way to stop him. Most party activists thought it was time for a fresh face, and his defeat suggests they were right. His late entry to the mayoral race may make it more likely that they get their wish next time. But it also points to the PSDB's failure to nurture a new generation of leaders.