Brazilian legislators have voted in favour of impeaching President Dilma Rousseff, a move that could see the country’s first female leader removed from power.
Tens of thousands of pro- and anti-impeachment protesters gathered in the capital Brasilia and other cities to watch the dramatic vote, broadcast live on national television on Sunday.
The impeachment motion will next go to the Senate which will vote, probably in May, whether to open a trial.
If the Senate now votes by a simple majority to proceed with the impeachment, Rousseff, 68, would be suspended from her post and be replaced by Vice President Michel Temer as acting president pending her trial. Temer would serve out Rousseff’s term until 2018 if she is found guilty.
The impeachment battle, which comes during Brazil’s worst recession since the 1930s, has divided the country of 200 million people more deeply than at any time since the end of its military dictatorship in 1985.
The 513 legislators voted one by one, all of them given 30 seconds to speak before casting their ballots. The floor of the lower house was a sea of Brazilian flags and pumping fists as dozens of lawmakers carried the deputy who cast the decisive 342nd vote – needed for impeachment to succeed – in their arms.
Outside Congress, rival protest rallies were separated by a metal barrier. Rousseff supporters cried while her opponents cheered every “yes” vote.
The ruling Workers’ Party vowed to continue to fight to keep Rousseff in the presidential palace.
“The fight is going to continue now in the streets and in the federal Senate,” said Jose Guimaraes, the leader of the Workers’ Party in the lower house. “We lost because the coup-mongers were stronger.”
Rousseff, 68, is accused of illegal accounting manoeuvres to mask government shortfalls during her 2014 re-election, but she has not been accused of corruption, reports Al-Jazeera.
Many Brazilians also hold her responsible for tanking the economy and a massive corruption scandal centred on state oil company Petrobras – a record that has left her government with 10 percent approval ratings.
Rousseff accused Vice President Temer and the house speaker of “treachery” and coup-plotting.
She also pledged to “fight until the last minute … to foil this coup attempt”.
Despite anger at rising unemployment, Rousseff’s Workers Party can rely on strong support among millions of working-class Brazilians, who credit its welfare programs with pulling their families out of poverty during the past 13 years.
