Chronicle Editor
Brasilia. — Embattled Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff vowed on Monday to wage a “long” fight against impeachment as Congress moved closer to putting her on trial in a deepening political crisis.
The 68-year-old leftist leader was in a combative mood in her public response since the lower house of Congress overwhelmingly voted late on Sunday to send her case to the Senate.
“I am outraged by the decision,” Rousseff told a news conference carried live on television.
Rousseff invoked her survival story under Brazil’s military dictatorship in the 1970s, when she was tortured as a young member of a violent guerrilla group.
“I have strength, spirit and courage. I will not be beaten, I will not be paralysed. I will continue to fight and I will fight as I did all my life,” she said.
“This is not the beginning of the end. The battle has begun. This fight will be very long and memorable,” she said.
Rousseff faces charges of illegally manipulating government accounts during her 2014 re-election to mask the scale of budget holes.
But Rousseff said that deputies in the house had failed to provide any evidence that she’d committed an impeachable crime, calling the process instead a “coup d’etat.”
She branded her Vice President, Michel Temer, a traitor who had conspired against her. He will take over if she’s impeached.
Monday’s newspapers printed pictures of him smiling as he watched the vote.
The president spoke after House Speaker Eduardo Cunha personally delivered the impeachment documents to the Senate.
Senators are expected to vote by mid-May on whether to open the proceedings and suspend Rousseff for up to six months.
The political showdown comes as Latin America’s biggest economy is mired in a deep recession and a corruption scandal at state oil giant Petrobras, with the Rio Olympics approaching in August.
After meeting with Cunha, Senate President Renan Calheiros said the upper chamber would begin reading the impeachment documents on Tuesday but that there would be no rush. — AFP.
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