Brazilian and international press were in Brasilia waiting for the Brazilian Senate’s decision whether or not to approve the removal of President Dilma Rousseff. After the process of impeachment was approved by the House of Deputies on April 17, senators debated for more than 20 hours in a section that began on May 11, and early morning May 12.
At the end of the vote, 55 senators approved and 22 disapproved the beginning of Dilma’s impeachment. For the process to be initiated, it took at least 41 affirmative votes. In this section 77 senators voted, there were two missing and the President of the Senate, Renan Calheiros, did not vote.
The quietest time of the debate was the speech from Senator Fernando Collor, the first impeachment target in 1992. He said he warned the government about the possibility of withdrawal. At the end, the impeachment committee rapporteur in the Senate, Antonio Anastasia, spoke for 15 minutes, followed by the Ministry of Attorney General of the Union, José Eduardo Cardozo who defended Dilma.
The president was away for 180 days and Vice President Michel Temer is already in charge of Brazil. From now on, the Senate will have to gather evidence and hear prosecution and defense witnesses. The judgememt will be chaired by President of the Supreme Court, Ricardo Lewandowski.
If found guilty, Dilma Rousseff will leave office and definitely will be ineligible for eight years. Temer will be president until the end of 2018. If cleared, she back go back to the presidency. This depends on the Senate again, and it must be approved by 54 votes out of a total of 81 senators. This section does not have time to happen, and may take up to 180 days to occur.
Even away from the Presidency, Rousseff still has the right to an official residence, personal safety, healthcare, air and ground transportation, compensation, and a staff service office.
In recent weeks, Michel Temer was beginning to think of their future government talking to businessmen and politicians. The new government ‘s slogan is order and progress, phrase described in the Brazilian flag.
One of the main charge against Rousseff is so-called “tax pedaling”, a practice that was used to delay payments from the National Treasury to public banks to temporarily improve the fiscal situation, which could be a tax liability offense. Another accusation is that President Rousseff edited a series of decrees in 2015, that resulted in the opening of additional credits, of very high values, without the preview authorisation of Congress. This too could be a crime of tax liability.
The process is not over and the press from all over the world are still attentive to Brazil. Meanwhile, the government of Michel Temer is working to try to lessen the economic crisis and the unemployment rate.
