BRASILIA (Prensa Latina) The battle unleashed by the process of impeachment against the deposed Brazilian president, Dilma Rousseff, is now being waged in the Supreme Federal Tribunal (STF), with two actions to be undertaken by the parties in dispute.
An injunction demanding the annulment of the Senate’s session, which approved by majority the definitive separation of Rousseff from the Presidency on August 31st, was presented on Thursday before the Supreme Court by defense attorney Jose Eduardo Cardozo.
The STF has been also asked to conduct a new political trial, not based on questioning the merits of the decision of the senators, but taking as premise the alleged unconstitutionality of the process.
According to Cardozo’s explanation, as quoted by Agencia Brasil, one of the questions posed questions the adequacy of two articles of the Law of Impeachment in the Constitution of 1988 and asks them to be declared unconstitutional.
The other one refers to the fact that the rapporteur of the case in the Senate, Antonio Anastasia, included in the indictment against Rousseff a decree not mentioned in the report approved in the Chamber of Deputies, which would mean a change in a step in the process, in which it is no longer possible to do so, as it would be detrimental to the defense.
This was not about a simple change in the legal characterization of the facts, but there was a real change of facts, he argued.
Meanwhile, the main promoters of the process against Rousseff, the parties of the Brazilian Social Democracy (PSDB), Democrats (DEM), the Brazilian Democratic Movement (PMDB) and Social Popular (PPS) announced that they would also appeal to the Supreme Court on Friday.
The leader of the PSDB in the Senate, Cássio Cunha Lima, said they will demand the separate vote on the appeal of the mandate of Dilma Rousseff, adopted by 61 votes to 20, and her disqualification from public office for a period of eight years, which was rejected by the plenary of the Senate.
In the latter case, 42 legislators supported the punishment, 36 voted against it and three abstained, making impossible to reach the figure of 54 votes required for approval.
Among those who voted against the disqualification of Rousseff there were several members from the PMDB, including president of the Senate, Renan Calheiros, and of the Special Committee on Impeachment, Ricardo Lira, which caused a manifest disgust among ‘toucans’ and Democrats, who accused the PMDB of making agreements in secret.
The president of the nation himself, Michel Temer (PMDB), acknowledged that the vote caused a ‘small embarrasment’ and demanded unconditional support from legislators. ‘If its government, it is government,’ he said, forgetting that, at least in theory,there should be independence between the executive and the legislative branches.
