The acting speaker of Brazil’s lower house of Congress, Waldir Maranhão (PP-MA), annulled the impeachment process against President Dilma Rousseff this Monday (9) and called for a new vote in the House.
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The lower house overwhelmingly voted to move forward with the process last month and it is those April 15-17 sessions that Maranhao annulled.
According to the BBC’s Brazil correspondent, Julia Carnero, the acting speaker had decided that MPs who spoke to the media before the impeachment vote breached procedures.
Mr Maranhao said there should be a new vote in the lower house, but Mr Calheiros called that decision illegal.
Dilma Rousseff was expecting to be impeached by Brazil’s congress over allegations she breached budgetary rules in government attempts to boost the country’s flagging economy and illegally hid the scale of the budget deficit. “At the end of the day, it’s not for the head of the Senate to say whether this process is fair or not, it’s up to the full Senate”. At that point, she would have been suspended from her office for a period of up to six months, with Vice President Michel Temer taking over in the interim.
In last month’s lower house vote, Maranhao voted against the impeachment process. Rousseff has said prior presidents have used such fiscal maneuvers and that the impeachment effort amounts to a “coup” aimed at removing her and her left-leaning Workers’ Party, which has governed the country for 13 years.
The Eurasia Group, a USA -based political and economic risk consultancy, said in a statement, “The decision certainly took most observers by surprise, but we think it very unlikely to hold”.
In a news conference in the capital, Brasilia, Cardozo hailed the decision, saying it would help correct what he alleged were the illegalities within the impeachment process.
He has said the Senate will continue deliberating Rousseff’s impeachment with a vote set to take place on Wednesday.
Hours after Maranhao’s decision was made public, an opposition party appealed to the Supreme Court to overturn it.
Amid the discussion, it is unclear if the vote will actually be held, and if Maranhão’s decision can be overruled by the Senate or the Supreme Court.
The Order of Attorneys of Brazil said it was “extremely concerned” and would take the appropriate legal steps to fight “the absurd and unacceptable decision”.
Rousseff was at a ceremony announcing the creation of five federal universities when the news broke on the mobiles of those in attendance, leading cabinet members, lawmakers, educators and students at the event to cry out in celebration.
Politicians being investigated in the Petrobras embezzlement ring include Calheiros, Maranhao and Rousseff’s presidential predecessor and political mentor Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.
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With the country due to host the Rio Olympics in three months’ time, there may still be no Dilma Rousseff to greet the dignitaries. She has vowed from the beginning of the impeachment process to fight it by all means legally possible.
