While Rousseff awaits trial she is permitted to remain in the president’s residence but is barred from the palace, the seat of the government.
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Should the impeachment move forward, Rousseff will have to be removed from office for the trial’s 180-day duration, during which Vice President Michel Temer will take over the presidency.
Brazil’s President Dilma Rousseff speaks during the opening of the National Conference of Women, in Brasilia, Brazil, Tuesday, May 10, 2016.
Brazil’s Senate has voted 55-22 to impeach the South American giant’s first woman president.
A simple majority is needed to approve the impeachment process – 41 votes out of 81.
(AP Photo/Felipe Dana). Pro-government demonstrators run from a cloud of pepper spray during clashes with the police outside Congress, in Brasilia, Brazil, Wednesday, May 11, 2016. The final vote is expected to take place around 8 p.m. (2300 GMT).
The Senate’s debate Wednesday night was a marathon – lasting more than 20 hours.
Senate President Renan Calheiros, who was overseeing the proceedings, said that impeachment would be “traumatic” for Brazil.
Rousseff was chief of staff during Silva’s second term and before that she was minister of mines and energy, positions where she was in a position to know about the widespread graft at Petrobras, her critics say.
A wall erected down the center of the lawn separated several thousand Rousseff supporters from a similar-sized group of pro-impeachment protesters.
If a simple majority of the 81 senators votes in favor, Rousseff will be suspended from office and Vice President Michel Temer will take over for up to six months pending a decision on whether to remove her from office permanently.
While the impeachment measure was based on allegations that Brazil’s first female president broke fiscal laws, the process morphed into something of a referendum on Rousseff and her handling of the country over the past six years.
And just as prices for commodities that are the lifeblood of Brazil’s economy started tumbling, investigators began uncovering a multibillion-dollar kickback scheme at Petrobras, the state oil company.
Supporters of impeachment blame Ms Rousseff and her Workers’ Party for the stalled economy and insist that Mr Temer, whose party has split from the governing coalition, represents the only hope of reviving it.
A special Senate committee will now investigate the accusations against Rousseff.
On the Senate floor, Communist Party Sen. “We will start to breathe again and the doctor will say the nation has given signs of life and will be stable soon”.
Senator Paulo Paim, a Rousseff ally, conceded that there could be no “miracle” outcome in the Senate vote and that his side would concentrate on saving her during the trial. Last week, Rousseff – heretofore not directly linked to the Petrobras probe – was herself accused of obstructing justice by the country’s prosecutor general, meaning she could face jail.
“I favor the impeachment because if there are proofs of a bad administrative management, she must be removed to preserve our democracy”, said Bruna Petit, local people. She has stressed that, unlike many of those who have pushed for impeachment, she does not face any allegations of personal corruption.
A former member of a Marxist guerrilla group who was tortured during Brazil’s 1964-1985 military dictatorship, she has called her impeachment a coup and vowed to fight the process until the last minute. Of the centrist Brazilian Democratic Movement party (PMDB), his policy agenda is expected to differ from that of his predecessor, with whom he was elected in 2014. Although Rousseff herself hasn’t been implicated, top officials in her party were and that tarnished her reputation.
Sen. Waldemir Moka told the upper house during his allotted time that, if the impeachment trial is successful, the future president will assume a government with a 250 billion Brazilian Real debt ($72.5 billion) according to conservative projections, with the possibility of being up to 600 billion Real ($174 billion).
Former President Fernando Collor de Mello, himself impeached by the senate in 1992, said he feels the country has “regressed politically”.
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Analysts have said Rousseff also got herself into trouble with a prickly manner and perceived reticence to work with legislators that alienated possible allies.
