Brazil's President, Dilma Rousseff, who is now facing a looming impeachment threat, hits back at Congress by calling her impeachment drive a sexist attempt by the male-dominated Congress to oust her.
Rousseff, Brazil's first female president, pressed there are no legal grounds to open up an impeachment trial against her. Congress' Chamber of Deputies voted in favor of her impeachment during a vote on Sunday. Rousseff is being accused of breaking budgetary laws for borrowing money from state banks to cover Brazil's deficits and at the same time fund her social programs.
"There has been, mixed in all of this, a large amount of prejudice against women," Rousseff told reporters at a press conference, as quoted by Reuters. "There are attitudes toward me that there would not be with a male president."
The impeachment motion will now proceed to the Senate. According to CNN, if the Senate majority approves the impeachment, Rousseff will be suspended from office for 180 days to defend herself in trial. She could be suspended as early as May, just three months before the 2016 Rio Olympics.
She would then become the first Brazilian president to face an impeachment trial in more than two decades.
Rousseff vowed to fight the impeachment and expressed confidence that she will the opportunity to defend herself in the Senate.
The Workers Party warned that Rousseff's successor will not receive anything from the party. They expressed opposition towards Rousseff's impeachment, saying an "illegitimate government will have no peace."
"Rousseff must be removed immediately. Eight ministries have no head and the economic crisis worsens day by day," Senator Ricardo Ferraco of the PSDB party stated, Newsweek noted.
With Rousseff's impeachment, Brazil is in the heat of a crisis fueled by the worst economic recession that the country has felt in decades. The country is also recovering from the Zika virus outbreak amidst preparations for the 2016 Rio Olympics.
