Copenhagen/Rio de Janeiro  - Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva celebrated Friday amid smiles and tears Rio de Janeiro's historic designation to host in 2016 South America's first- ever Olympic Games.

"This is not an individual victory, but a victory of 190 million souls, a victory of the South American continent, a victory of the whole of Latin America," Lula told Brazilian television.

He argued that Rio's win was based on the fact that the Brazilian bid offered members of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) something different: "heart and soul."

"The substantial difference was that those who were here to vote saw in our eyes that we came here with heart and soul. The other countries came here with proposals, we came with our heart and our soul," he said tirelessly.

Wiping off his tears every now and then, Lula compared Rio's win with his own victory in the 2002 presidential election, when he was elected to become Brazil's first-ever president of working-class origin.

"Those who think that Rio does not have the ability (to host the Games) will be surprised, just as those who thought that we would not be able to govern Brazil were surprised," he said.

Brazil "stopped being a second-class country and definitively joined the level of first-class nations," Lula stressed. "The World Bank already said that in 2016 Brazil will be the world's fifth- largest economy. Nobody doubts our economic and social greatness anymore."

At the same time, he refused to accept that the win was his own in a duel against US President Barack Obama, who defended Chicago's bid in Copenhagen.

"I didn't beat Obama, it was Rio that beat Chicago. I am a very good friend of Obama's," he noted.  dpa