In Brazil, all eyes are on the new government, run by Michel Temer. The interim president was inaugurated a fortnight ago when the Senate suspended president—and former Marxist guerrilla—Dilma Rousseff in order to bring impeachment proceedings against her. Many people are wondering whether he can improve Brazil's dire economic situation—last year the country's GDP fell by almost 4 per cent, while unemployment was at around ten per cent at the end of March. The country's economic woes helped to bring Rousseff down and toppled Brazil from its position as an emerging economic star. But let us focus on the other crucial issue here: the legitimacy of the process that saw Rousseff impeached and Temer come to power. This is likely to remain contentious and may significantly affect Temer's ability to run the country. The formal grounds for Rousseff’s impeachment were her alleged violations of budgetary laws: she is accused of disguising the size of Brazil's public deficit. But its is clear that her unpopularity among the Brazilian people and in the Brazilian parliament were the actual reasons for it. Both forms of unpopularity were fueled not only by the country's dire economic situation but also the multibillion-dollar corruption scandal in the giant state oil company Petrobras, uncovered in a large police investigation nicknamed "Lava Jato" (car wash, after the place where the first evidence was found).The odd thing is that, while Rousseff—who came to power in 2011—is not directly implicated in the scandal, many of the legislators who voted for her impeachment, and many of the ministers chosen by Temer, are. This, it has been claimed, may be their reason for pursuing the impeachment—they may want to obstruct investigations into their own affairs. In fact, two leading figures in the impeachment process who were in the new government have fallen in the last fortnight. The first, Eduardo Cunha, the president of the Lower House who oversaw the impeachment vote, was suspended from his post in Parliament by the Supreme Court for interfering with corruption investigations against him. The second, senator Romero Jucá, a key minister in the new government, was forced to "temporarily resign" barely 12 days into his new post. Although his links to Lava Jato were not enough to prevent Temer from appointing him, three days ago a phone conversation recorded before the impeachment vote leaked. In it, he said "We must stop this shit. The government must fall to stop the bleeding," referring to the corruption investigation that implicates him. This proved too much. (Temer himself, it should be noted, is not yet under formal investigation—though he has been cited several times by those arrested already.)
"In Brazil, impeachment is neither a purely political instrument to get rid of presidents who lose political support in Parliament (like a no-confidence vote), nor a purely legal remedy"
How seriously does all this affect the legitimacy of the impeachment, and the legitimacy of the new government? The formal grounds for impeachment are flimsy: budgetary violations are relatively common in Brazilian politics. Combine this with the tainted reputations of some of those who are pursuing it, and you might wonder whether this is a sort of coup d’etat, even if a soft one that uses a forced interpretation of the constitutional text rather than violence.On the other hand, Rousseff’s economic and political incompetence is not disputed by anyone sensible. This has given rise to the idea that impeachment was the only way to save the country from the abyss. Many are torn between these two positions, and their choice is made harder by the fact that both Rousseff’s Worker’s Party (known as PT) and Temer’s Brazilian Democratic Movement Party (PMDB) are deeply mired in the corruption scandal.The difficulty in picking sides is compounded by the fact that impeachment is neither a purely political instrument to get rid of presidents who lose political support in Parliament (like a no-confidence vote), nor a purely legal remedy which protects them from ousting unless there is proof beyond reasonable doubt that they have committed a serious crime. It is rather a hybrid, political-legal mechanism that enables the removal of governments that have both lost political support and perpetrated what the Constitution calls “crimes of responsibility."This rather vague notion, defined as “acts that violate the Constitution," works against incumbent presidents, as in the present case, but this disadvantage is significantly counterweighed by the high quorum required. Support of a mere third of the Lower House, or a third of the Senate is sufficient to block the procedure, something easily managed by Rousseff’s predecessors (Lula and Cardoso), both victims of unsuccessful impeachment attempts.Rousseff is hardly just a helpless victim. But the new interim government, tainted by identical if not worse practices, provides few hopes for an auspicious future. In an ideal scenario both the suspended and interim presidents would resign so that fresh elections could take place. The likely scenario, however, is that Lava Jato will continue to dictate the country’s political destiny.
