Brazilian Parliament, Rio de Janeiro – On Sunday, 367 lawmakers in the Brazilian parliament’s lower house voted to impeach the country’s first female President Dilma Rousseff. Now the impeachment motion will go right to the Brazil’s Senate, reported CNN.
Rousseff will be forced to step down for a maximum 180 days to defend herself against corruption accusations in an impeachment trial if the upper house approves the impeachment motion, which could be in May.
Meanwhile, protests of those who are in favor of the government and those who don’t are splitting the country in two. And there’s still a long way to come before Rousseff fate can be decided, so the tumults might continue in the country until the final vote it’s made, which should be set by the end of this year at the latest.
The schedule of the impeachment motion against Rousseff
The process was sent to Brazil’s upper house on Monday and it will be read on the Senate floor the next day. On Tuesday will be announced a committee formed by 21 parliamentarians and the list of alternates to evaluate the matter. The identity of the senators that will be part of the committee will be announced next Monday. The committee will have to nominate its president and speaker in 24 hours.
The committee will have 10 days to discuss and recommend whether to continue with the impeachment process, which will be voted on by simple majority. Whatever the results are, the recommendation must be considered by the whole Senate.
In early May the Senate might decide whether to take on the case and, if it proceeds, Brazil’s president will be notified and will have to step down from office while the Senate evaluates the case. Vice-President Michael Temer would assume the presidency for the interim.
The temporary succession may be problematic for Temer, whose party, the Brazilian Democratic Movement Party, it’s also implicated in the corruption scheme, so impeachment proceedings may be applied to him as well.
It’s expected that by early November, at the latest, the committee will proceed with the investigation phase. After Rousseff presents her defense, in a maximum of 20 days, the committee will have to examine the documents and all the evidence consigned by Rouseff and her foes. This phase has no deadline defined by the law.
If the impeachment motion gets approved by the committee too, then the next step is to schedule the date for the final vote, which will be chaired by the president of the Supreme Court at the Senate. To remove the president from office, two-thirds majority will be needed.
Source: CNN