Brazil's suspended President Dilma Rousseff was impeached today Wednesday August 31 following a 61-20 vote by the country’s senate.
Senators broke into protest, cheers and applause after the electronic
voting, which went on for hours, was announced. Pro-impeachment senators
burst into a rendering of the national anthem,
some waving Brazilian flags, while allies of Rousseff stood stony face.
"I will not associate my name to this infamy," read a sign held up by one senator.
68-year-old Rousseff, the country's first female president, will be removed from office and replaced by Vice President
Michel Temer, 75. He will be sworn in on Wednesday to serve out her term which extends through 2018.
The impeachment comes two days after Rousseff staged an impassioned defense of her actions
on Monday and insisted she was innocent of any wrongdoing in an
lengthy speech before the senate. Lawmakers had charged that she
breached fiscal rules in an attempt to cover up the nation’s budget
woes.
"I know I will be judged, but my conscience is clear. I did not
commit a crime," Rousseff, told senators on Monday. "I can’t help
but taste the bitterness of injustice."
Rousseff
described the impeachment
process, which has been going on for about a year, amounted to an
illegal coup. She said the move was aimed at protecting the interests
of the country's economic elite and rolling back social programs that
lifted millions of Brazilians from poverty during the last decade.
Recalling
how she was tortured and imprisoned in the 1970s for belonging to a
leftist guerrilla group, Rousseff urged senators to "vote against
impeachment, vote for democracy. Do not accept a coup.
Her
opponents, however, have hailed the chance to turn the page on a
drawn-out political crisis, the country's worst recession and a sweeping
corruption scandal at state oil company Petrobras.
About 50 leftist demonstrators gathered outside the presidential palace to show their support.
"We are protesting against the coup and fighting for democracy," said 61-year-old farmer Orlando Ribeiro.
In
the center of the capital, extra security and the closing of avenues
near the Senate caused massive traffic jams. Police said they were
preparing for large protests later in the day.
Lawyers presenting closing arguments could not hold back
their emotions as the clock wound down on a crisis that has paralyzed
Brazilian politics for months. A lead lawyer for the case
against Rousseff, Senator Janaina Paschoal, wept as she asked
forgiveness for causing the president "suffering," but insisted it was
the right thing to do.
"The Brazilian people must be aware that nothing illegal and illegitimate is being done here," she said.
Rousseff's
counsel, veteran lawyer Jose Eduardo Cardozo, retorted that the charges
were trumped up to punish the president's support for a huge corruption
investigation that has snared many of Brazil's elite.
"This is a farce," he said in a speech during which his voice alternated between shouts and near whispers. We
should ask her forgiveness if she is convicted," he added. "History
will treat her fairly. History will absolve Dilma Rousseff if you
convict her."
Cardozo said shhe would
appeal the impeachment through the Supreme Court. Rousseff is the first
Brazilian leader to be dismissed from office since 1992, when Fernando
Collor de Mello resigned before a final vote in his impeachment trial
for corruption.
