Rousseff impeachment trial opens
Senators launched the impeachment trial of Brazil’s suspended President Dilma Rousseff on Thursday, expected to end 13 years of her party’s rule in Latin America’s biggest economy.
The warm vibe of the Rio Olympic Games has faded and tension returned as the emotionally charged affair nears its climax, with Rousseff facing removal from office within days.
Chief justice Ricardo Lewandowski declared the trial open and later briefly suspended it as senators yelled at each other while debating procedural matters.
Media calculate that a majority of Senators will find Rous- seff, 68, guilty of cooking the budget books to mask the depth of the country’s economic problems during her 2014 re-election campaign.
If she is removed from office, her center-right former vice-president turned rival Michel Temer will be sworn in to serve until 2018.
“Senators, now you must turn into judges and set aside your ideological, partisan and personal positions,” Lewandowski told the house.
But the impeachment affair is heavily politically charged.
Rousseff ’s rivals blame her for economic chaos and are out to crush her Workers’ Party, or PT. “I am going to vote for impeachment, which is a political instrument that permits us to remove from power anyone who is misusing it,” said Simone Tebet, a senator from Temer’s PMDB party.
Rousseff ’s predecessor, PT founder Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, said in Rio: “Today begins a week of national shame.”
Rousseff has sworn to resist what she calls a coup.
“We will fight to reinforce democracy in our country with the same force that I fought against the military dictatorship,” she told supporters late on Wednesday.
The trial will climax on Monday when the president, who was suspended from office in May, addresses the Senate herself for the first time.
A vote is expected within 48 hours, with a two-thirds majority of the 81 senators required to bring Rousseff down.
A huge metal barricade was set up on the esplanade outside Congress to separate rival demonstrators, with large protests expected on Monday.
(It) is a political instrument that permits us to remove from power anyone who is misusing it.” Simone Tebet, senator from PMDB party