Brazil: Congress gives green light for impeachment of President Rousseff

The move to impeach Brazil’s president Dilma Rousseff could soon begin as a congressional commission on Monday voted for the process to go ahead.

The 65-member congressional commission voted 30 to 27 in favour of the impeachment over claims that Rousseff manipulated government accounts to hide a growing deficit.

Her political rivals accuse her of using the country’s pension fund to shore up budget gaps, claims she has denied.

The vote in Congress, took place amid chaotic scenes with Rousseff’s supporters and opponents chanting slogans and waving placards.

Breaking: Brazil congressional committee moves forward with presidential impeachment, setting up broader vote https://t.co/IaRhLlEz86

— Wall Street Journal (@WSJ) April 11, 2016

With the congressional recommendation, Brazil’s lower house is now expected to vote on the matter on April 17 or 18.

If two-thirds of the lower house votes for the impeachment, the recommendation will then move on to the upper house for final consideration.

There, another two-thirds of vote is required for the impeachment to be effective.

But leader of the ruling Workers Party in congress, Afonso Florence does not see the impeachment going through.

“It requires two thirds of votes. It required 43 votes in the impeachment commission, but they got just 38 there. There’s no doubt that this week will be full of political debate in Brazil. But I’m confident to say that they will not get the two thirds of votes,” he said.

The move to impeach president Rousseff has divided Brazil and the police are bracing up for mass protests in the capital, Brasilia.

Instead of focusing on the upcoming Olympic games, Dilma Rousseff’s administration is having to deal with a dwindling public trust in her government as some top officials of her Workers Party have been arrested in the ongoing probe into the Petrobras scandal.

_Reuters, News Agencies _