In Brazil, laws are obeyed

It was a scene which is becoming increasingly rare. A sitting president of a country faces impeachment and is ordered to step down. The president, albeit grudgingly, obeys the law and indeed, steps down.   This is what happened in Brazil. The new interim president, former Vice President Michel Temer, now takes charge following a marathon night in the Brazilian Senate where the House voted 55 to 22 to subject President Dilma Rousseff to an impeachment process. The country’s first female president must step aside for up to 180 days. Rousseff repeated her long-standing allegation that the process against her amounted to a coup, warning that the democratic sovereignty of the 54 million votes cast for her in 2014 was in danger. “Those who could not reach this palace through the support of the people are taking power by force,” said Rousseff as she tried to lay her case in the court of public opinion. But the rhetoric ended there. Her fighting words could have incited a nationwide rebellion. To Brazil’s credit, it did not.  What has transpired in Brazil did not look anything like a coup. In many other countries facing the same situation, the president would not have stepped aside so graciously. There are presidents who would have, and have, barricaded themselves inside the presidential palace, imposed a state of emergency, ordered martial law, put down a curfew and given orders to the army to shoot protesters on sight. That has not happened in Brazil even though Rousseff’s impeachment is considered by many to be taking place, effectively, on a technicality. She was tried by the senate on charges that she committed a “crime of responsibility”. That charge stems from the run-up to her re-election in 2014, when she manipulated the budget in order to cover up a shortfall in state funds. It is in Brazil a widely used, albeit irregular, fiscal practice. What Rousseff did was an accounting sleight-of-hand. In other countries, the practice would not amount to an incumbent president facing impeachment and being forced out of office. That the Brazilian political spectacle ended in a peaceful transfer of power with not a single drop of blood shed speaks for a mature and responsible political system that should be emulated by governments around the word, especially those of the Third World. It would not have been surprising had Brazil erupted. It is suffering from its worst recession in 10 years, unemployment reached nine percent in 2015 and inflation is at a 12-year high. Along with the precarious state of the Brazilian economy the country faces a number of other, high-profile challenges, including the Zika virus. But due process of the law was followed to the letter. If it had not, there would have been pandemonium in the streets which, among other things, would have affected the staging of the Rio Olympics that start in August. But the International Olympic Committee said it remains confident the Summer Olympics will be held. A special senate committee will now investigate the accusations against Rousseff. Once that committee is done, her team will have 20 days to present her defense. After that, the committee will vote on a final determination and then present it for a vote in the full senate. It will take a two-thirds majority to remove the president from office. Should Rousseff be found guilty of the charges, she will be deposed as president, with Temer serving out the remainder of the term. No countrywide revolt is anticipated. Her 180-day suspension fittingly ends on Nov. 8, when another smooth transfer of power is expected, this one the US presidential elections. As smooth as silk, presidents come, presidents go. That is political order.