Politics
With just a few hours remaining before Brazil’s parliament begins a crucial vote, President Dilma Rousseff appealed to the Supreme Court to block the impeachment proceedings against her. Rousseff’s last-minute attempt comes within a day after the country’s senate overturned the interim speaker’s decision to invalidate a previous impeachment vote against her.
Citing procedural bias and irregularities, Brazil’s attorney general José Eduardo Cardozo called on the court to annul the impeachment proceedings.
Rousseff, who faces a suspension of 180 days if the parliament approves a full impeachment trial against her, has resorted to similar means in the past but failed to convince the judiciary in her favor, writes the BBC. Earlier, the leader’s supporters took to streets across all Brazilian states, protesting against the “biased” proceedings against the president.
Rousseff’s opponents require 41 votes to advance her trial to the upper chamber, writes The Guardian. Besides, there is a strong possibility that her adversaries will reach the figure of 54 votes to oust Rousseff from the presidential office at the end of the trial, which is expected to last for six months.
Rousseff, who is accused of manipulating national budget, has been maintaining her innocence saying that the trial against her is an attempted “judicial coup” to topple her democratically elected government.
