Coup against her has chief and vice-chief, says Rousseff

President Dilma Rousseff said today (Apr. 12) that the coup advancing in Congress against her has chief and vice-chief. Not mentioning names, in many parts of today's speech at Palácio do Planalto, the presidential office, the president referred to situations and events related to Vice-President Michel Temer and Lower House Speaker Eduardo Cunha.

"If there was any doubt about the coup plot, the farce and betrayal, there is not any more. If there was any doubt about my allegations that a coup plot is being hatched, there can be no more. The plot may have assumed chief and vice-chief. I could not define yet who is the chief and the vice-chief," she said

Then the president mentioned that one of them is "the not so invisible hand that leads the impeachment process with misuse of power and unimaginable abuse." The lower house speaker is the one responsible for conducting the process. On Monday, the Impeachment Special Committee voted 38 to 27 to recommend going ahead with impeachment proceedings against President Rousseff. All eyes will now be on a full vote in the lower house. If approved, proceedings will move to Senate that will give the final word on the president's ouster.

The president added that the other conspirator was “rubbing his hands in glee while carrying out a farcical leak of an inaugural speech." Here there is a clear reference to the vice-president, who, yesterday (Apr. 11), apologized for the release, by accident, of an audio in which he speaks as if impeachment proceedings had already been approved by the Chamber of Deputies. In the audio, Temer says he must be prepared to address "the serious problems facing" Brazil in the event senators decide in favor of ousting Rousseff.

"We are living in strange times of a coup, of farce and betrayal. They turned the leak into a farce to spread a united order for conspiracy. They now are conspiring openly, in the light of day, to destabilise a legitimately elected president. They slander while auctioning positions in the cabinet of the coup, in a government of no-vote,” the president declared before an audience of teachers and students during an act, entitled “Education for Democracy Meeting.”

Translated by Amarílis Anchieta