Impeachment proceedings opened against Brazil’s Rousseff

The speaker of Brazil’s lower house of Congress, announced Wednesday that he has authorized impeachment proceedings into Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff.

The petition, filed by opposition figures and a founder of Ms Rousseff’s leftist Workers’ Party, accuses her of illegally fiddling government accounts to mask budget holes.

Their findings will then go to a vote to the whole lower house, where a two thirds majority – 342 votes – will be needed to approve the impeachment of the President.

“Statistics are saying that employers are discouraged from investing in this year of intense political turmoil and disorder in public finances”, said economics columnist Beth Cataldo on the G1 news portal. A parliamentary ethics committee is now deliberating whether to open a motion on allegations of corruption that could lead to Cunha’s removal as speaker.

The impeachment process could take months, involving several votes in Congress that ultimately may result in the president being ousted.

While Rousseff and Cunha battle in Congress, Brazil is heading into an ever deeper recession, with rising inflation and employment, a currency one third down over the year, and mounting turmoil over the Petrobras scandal.

Cunha also faces the prospect of being removed from his post, and some analysts say the move to impeach Rousseff was probably in retaliation against members of her center-left Workers’ Party for supporting an Ethics Committee investigation of the conservative leader on accusations he hid millions of dollars in Swiss bank accounts.

In a televised address to the nation, Rousseff expressed her “outrage” at Cunha’s decision and said there was no evidence of any wrongdoing by her. Rousseff will challenge any proceedings in the Supreme Court, according to a government official with direct knowledge of her defense strategy.

Mr Cunha had been threatening to open impeachment proceedings if the governing party did not offer him backing, says the BBC’s Julia Carneiro in Rio de Janeiro.

Chris Probyn, Chief Economist at State Street Global Advisors, said that Brazil is in “political paralysis”.

The impeachment measure will now be considered by a special House commission in which all political parties will be represented.

The defeated opposition candidate in last year’s presidential election, Senator Aecio Neves, has tweeted that he supports the impeachment request.

She has defended Brazilians’ right to protest and acknowledged the need to clean up corruption at Petrobras, but denied any prior knowledge of the alleged kickback scheme.