(VOVworld) – Brazil’s lower house has voted for President Dilma Rousseff's impeachment 367 to 137 with 7 abstentions. Rousseff is accused of hiding a budgetary deficit to win re-election in 2014.
 

A pro-impeachment supporter kisses a Brazilian flag, as lower house deputies vote to approve the motion to continue the impeachment process of President Dilma Rousseff (photo: Getty Images)

When the final tally was announced, the opposition party celebrated its victory with firework displays in Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. A two-thirds majority vote sends the impeachment motion to the Senate. If the Senate votes in favor of impeachment with a two-thirds majority, Rousseff will be deposed and replaced by Vice President Michel Temer until the end of her second term in 2018.

The ruling Workers’ Party (PT) has accepted defeat and compared Rousseff’s impeachment to the worst coup in Brazil’s history. President Rousseff and her supporters say history will condemn the masterminds of the current political turmoil. She insists the accusations against her are false and she is not guilty. Rousseff says current problems threaten Brazil’s recent achievements and violate the fundamental rights of Brazilians. She has denounced the people who are behind the plot to topple her and open opportunities for international groups to exploit Brazil’s natural resources.  

The impeachment fight has occurred with Brazil suffering its worst economic recession since 1930 and its most serious political division since the last dictatorship ended in 1985. Rousseff is not personally accused of corruption but her government has lost its prestige in the oil giant Petrobras’s corruption scandal and the economic recession. Rousseff’s PT party still has strong support among the common people, who have benefited from the government’s social welfare programs over the past 10 years.

Some politicians have called for an early election if the President is impeached. But that would violate Brazilian law. If Rousseff is replaced by Vice President Temer, Brazil will likely experience serious instability.