Jose Mujica, a senator and former president of Uruguay, said Thursday that deposed Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff was ousted because she did not yield to pressure from politicians accused of corruption—and for not being corrupt herself.
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"This woman was condemned for not entering into corruption," Mujica said during a meeting with workers unions in Uruguay. The ex-president said the impeachment process against Rousseff began after she refused to give parliamentary protection to former speaker of the Lower House, Eduardo Cunha.
Cunha was suspended by the Supreme Court in May over allegations he directly participated in the state-run oil company Petrobras' corruption scheme. He is being investigated for receiving US$40 million in bribes and hiding money in Swiss bank accounts.
Mujica said both the Workers Party and the president didn’t intervene to prevent the investigations, and according to him that was the reason behind Rousseff’s conviction.
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"What they had in Brazil was a coup. Put whichever name you want, but it is so," said Mujica. It was "the consummation of a coup that was previously announced a while ago."
According to Muica, the last time current Brazilian Ambassador Jose Serra visited Uruguay he said that everything was already decided and "all this discussion in the Senate was a huge pantomime."
After a long process, Dilma Rousseff was definitively removed from office on Wednesday, with 61 senators in favor of impeachment and 20 against, in a quorum of 81 senators. On Wednesday afternoon, interim President Michel Temer was sworn into office.
Rousseff was accused of manipulating state budgets to hide a deficit ahead of her re-election in 2014.