Senators debated the fate of Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff into the wee hours of Wednesday ahead of a planned vote later in the day on whether to remove Rousseff permanently as leader of Latin America’s most populous country.
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“We hope and believe that Brazil can continue to maintain national stability and socio-economic development and continue to play an important role in worldwide and regional affairs”, she said, when asked about Rousseff’s removal. “Do not judge an innocent person”, she said in her defense on Monday before the Senate, the last attempt to retain her post.
Senators voted on Wednesday by a majority of 61 to 20 to remove Rousseff from office.
Her conservative rival Michel Temer was due to be sworn in as her replacement later today.
Riot police clash with supporters of ousted president Dilma Rousseff in Sao Paulo, Brazil, August 31, 2016.
Senators want to separate the vote on her removal from the presidency from a ban on holding public office for eight years.
A stalwart of the center-right PMDB party, Temer has vowed to steer Brazil away from 13 years of Workers’ Party rule in hopes that a more market-friendly track will resolve the country’s worst recession in decades.
Although Rousseff has never been personally implicated, many blame her for the graft because much of it happened while her party was in power.
Cheers – and cries of disappointment – erupted in the blue-carpeted, circular Senate chamber as the impeachment verdict flashed up on the electronic voting screen.
Rousseff is on trial for breaking fiscal responsibility laws in her management of the federal budget. “He trusts that under President Temer’s leadership, Brazil and the United Nations will continue their traditional close partnership”.
More than 100 people have been arrested in the last two years, accused of involvement in an estimated $3 billion scheme in which politicians are accused of taking kickbacks from state-run oil company Petrobras.
Meanwhile, the police, in special equipment, blocked the major thoroughfares of the city and tried to disperse the demonstrators using tear gas and stun.
The presentations came in the final phase of a political fight that has polarized Brazil since the impeachment measure was introduced in the lower Chamber of Deputies late a year ago.
Rousseff’s lawyer Jose Eduardo Cardozo said he would bring a legal challenge against the impeachment to the high court. On the flip side, 62 percent said they wanted new elections to resolve the crisis.
“But she could be a candidate (for president) in 2022”.
Rousseff rejects the accusations against her and announced she will appeal the decision.
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Aecio Neves, leader of the center-right PSDB party that backs Temer, said the divisions had caused acute concern among his allies, but he denied there was any prospect of a split.
