About 4,000 protesters held a silent protest in the stadium holding the opening match of the World Cup on Wednesday night, according to The Associate Press.
Sao Paulo, Brazil's biggest city, will host the World Cup's opening match next week, and protests have already begun, the AP reported.
Wednesday's protest was organized by the Homeless Workers Movement who are calling on the government to provide more low-income housing, according to the AP.
In the latest protest by Brazilians ahead of soccer's premier event, the demonstrators made their way down a main thoroughfare in eastern Sao Paulo holding aloft banners and blocking traffic, the AP reported. The HWM has carried out three similar protests in a peaceful manner.
Last year, anti-government protests fueled in part by anger over the billions spent to host the World Cup took over streets in cities across Brazil during the Confederations Cup, a soccer tournament that is a warm-up event for the World Cup, according to the AP. Several protests saw violent clashes between police and demonstrators.
Workers on Sao Paulo's subway system will also launch an open-ended strike on Thursday, AFP.com reported. The strike will affect about 4.5 million daily passengers.
The strike will raise fears of transport chaos in the Brazilian economic capital, a sprawling city of 20 million people, one week before it hosts the opening match, according to AFP.com.
After negotiations broke down for a 16.5 percent pay raise, the workers decided to go on strike from midnight Thursday, a union spokesman told AFP, AFP.com reported.
Transport chaos erupted in Sao Paulo last month when bus drivers went on strike for two days, affecting more than a million passengers, according to the AFP.com. The subway acted as a key pressure valve during that strike, helping stranded commuters reach their destinations.
Brazil has been gripped by a wave of strikes ahead of the World Cup and elections in October, as well as by protests over the more than $11 billion being spent on the tournament, AFP.com reported.
