Brazil President Rousseff gears up for impeachment trial

Brazil’s President Dilma Rousseff is set to face trial following the Senate’s vote to impeach and suspend her. President Rousseff is accused of illegally manipulating finances to hide a growing public deficit ahead of her re-election in 2014.

While denying the allegations, she has called her impeachment a “coup”.

During the period in which Dilma Rousseff is suspended, it will be the Vice-President Michel Temer who takes charge of the country which once again is in the midst of political and economic volatility after a recent decade of prosperity.

The vote which came out as 55-22 brings an end to over 13 years of left-wing Workers Party rule. The party’s rise from the labor movement helped millions of Brazillians come out of poverty and saw many of its leaders face investigations on corruption.

Many Brazilians are concerned that the end of Workers Party rule could bring back bad times for the poor, who have made great strides in the last decade.

“Has Dilma made mistakes? Of course. But the Workers Party has done so much for us, for the people,” said Benedito Polongo, a 63-year-old janitor outside a shiny Brasilia business center, who said he had no job or bank account before the party came to power. – source: BBC

The trial of President Rousseff may last up to 180 days, which will also make her unavailable during the Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, set to start on the 5th of August.

The impeachment process began in the lower house of Congress in December and Rousseff, a 68-year-old economist and former Marxist guerrilla who was Brazil’s first female president, is unlikely to be acquitted in a trial that could last as long as six months.

Rousseff’s government made a last-ditch effort to annul her impeachment but it was rejected by the Supreme Court on Wednesday (May 11).

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