Brazil opposition to seek Rousseff impeachment next week

By Ben Tavener

SAO PAULO

Brazil opposition lawmakers will push for impeachment proceedings to begin next week against embattled President Dilma Rousseff, local media reported Friday. It comes after the country's top audit court, the TCU, ruled that the government's 2014 accounts had been manipulated in the run-up to last year's presidential elections to give a better impression of the economy and sustain spending on social programs.

The TCU's recommendation is not legally-binding, however, and it falls to Congress to decide whether it will reject the government's accounts, which the speaker of the lower house, Eduardo Cunha, said Thursday would probably not happen until 2016.

The Folha de S.Paulo newspaper reported Friday that opposition figures determined to remove Rousseff from office will not wait for Congress to rule on the accounts, and believe the TCU's judgment constitutes grounds to initiate impeachment proceedings.

The opposition group will act to begin proceedings Oct. 13, the newspaper reported.

Opposition leader Sen. Aecio Neves, who narrowly lost to Rousseff in the elections, called the TCU's ruling "historic" and said it had "proved" that the president had "broken the law on successive occasions" during the run-up to the vote.

It falls to Speaker Cunha, who opposes Rousseff's government despite being a member of a ruling coalition party, to approve a congressional vote required to open impeachment proceedings.

Cunha has received and shelved numerous requests, citing a lack of evidence, but one application -- lodged by a founder and now ex-member of Rousseff's Workers' Party, Helio Bicudo, and former justice minister Miguel Real Jr -- is considered to have greater weight.

Proceedings will commence if two-thirds of Brazil's 513 deputies vote to approve the process.

But even if Cunha were to shelve the request, lawmakers could appeal in a special congressional session, which would proceed if a majority present voted accordingly. Local media say this route is preferred by Cunha, as it shifts responsibility on to opposition legislators.

Rousseff summoned her Cabinet Thursday to discuss the TCU's judgment and warn her team to "be watchful" of "actions against democracy" -- widely interpreted as a demand to protect her against impeachment attempts.

Chief of Staff Jaques Wagner told reporters after the meeting that impeachment was "the consequence of an objective, concrete fact that is laid down in the Constitution" and that those seeking the president's ouster had been "scavenging for things".

Political experts told Anadolu Agency that there are two other scenarios in which the president might remove from office, both concerning an investigation into a sprawling kickback scheme at on state-run oil giant Petrobras.

First, should evidence be found directly linking the president to the corruption scandal and, second, if witness statements alleging that sources for Rousseff's 2014 reelection campaign included kickbacks from the scandal were proved by an investigation recently reopened by Brazil's top electoral court, then the result of the 2014 election could be invalidated.