The political path of Dilma Rousseff and its mischiefs

The international media press has been watching Dilma Rousseff's impeachment process from a far position and, based only on official announcements by the government and its representatives, has been calling it a "coup". Before making any judgment about the legitimacy of the process, it's utterly important to understand its accusations and also its defenses. As a reminder I should say it's not my interest to either support or boycott Rousseff's government – my main reason is to inform how things are going on in a less opinionated way, differing from most newspapers and magazines all over Brazil.

Rousseff was first elected as President in 2010, after a large battle against José Serra, her main opponent, with whom she faced a second voting round and won with 56.05% of valid votes. Before being launched as candidate, Rousseff was not a popular figure in Brazil, like her antecessor Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, but she gained his support on her presidential campaign – they are both from the same political party, PT (standing for Worker's Party). During the first round, Rousseff was competing against the following candidates: José Serra (PSDB, standing for Brazilian Social Democracy's Party), Marina Silva (PV, standing for Green Party), Plínio de Arruda Sampaio (PSOL, standing for Socialism and Liberty Party), José Maria Eymael (PSDC, standing for Social Democrat Christian Party), José Maria de Almeida (PSTU, standing for Unified Workers' Socialist Party), Levy Fidélix (PRTB, standing for Brazilian Worker Renewing Party), Ivan Pinheiro (PCB, standing for Brazilian Communist Party), and Rui da Costa Pimenta (PCO, standing for Factory Workers' Cause Party). According to official data, the 2010 presidential election owned around 101 million of valid votes, from which 47 million were meant for Rousseff, and 33 million, for Serra. The Brazilian law states that a second round is mandatory if none of the candidates reach more than 50% of valid votes – Rousseff reached only 46.91%, and Serra, 32.61%. As a result, both candidates fought against each other, and Rousseff won over Serra's percentage of 43.95%.

During her first government, Dilma Rousseff had hard times as a politician, since she had never been elected to any public occupation before. So she didn't have enough political experience, which led her to be truly unpopular amidst parliamentarians, making decision takings harder than usual. Throughout the four years of her command, she had Lula as her mentor and a present figure beside her, since he was a very popular president and has agreements with many important people into political sphere. Although, Rousseff was not a great politician, which led to her unpopularity as President, not only nationally, but also internationally (she doesn't have the same appeal as Lula to make deals with other countries), seen as an impassive Head of State (as she hardly ever negotiates with the Parliament, both Federal Senate and Chamber of Deputies, to approve her Constitutional Amendments).

In 2013, Rousseff faced a great political crisis when people rioting against, at first, the increase of bus tickets' price, but, shortly after, against the whole sickness of Brazilian political system. Her effiency as a President started being questioned, because of her mistakes as an administrator, so when she announced that she was running for re-election in 2014, it was quite unclear if she was capable of reconquering her popularity in time.

For 2014 presidential election, Rousseff faced competition against these candidates: Aécio Neves (PSDB), who faced the second round against her; Marina Silva (PSB, standing for Brazilian Socialist Party); Luciana Genro (PSOL); Eduardo Jorge (PV); Levy Fidélix (PRTB); José Maria de Almeida (PSTU); José Maria Eymael (PSDC); Mauro Iasi (PCB); e Rui da Costa Pimenta (PCO). Although Neves was the candidate who reached the second round, after receiving 33.55% of valid notes (Rousseff received 41.59%), he was almost defeated by increasing popularity of Marina Silva, who tried to run for election by a brand-new party, Rede Sustentabilidade (standing for Sustainability Network) but was ultimately prevented to get the party's registration and ran to another party, PSB. Silva, despite this confusion, owned 22 million votes, which is definitely not negligible.

However, the second round was fought by Rousseff and Neves, with the President being re-elected with 51.64% of valid votes, against 48.36% for Neves. In comparison to her first victory, Rousseff's popularity had clearly decreased, such as her acceptance as a leader among parliamentarians. In addition, Rousseff made a bunch of promises during the presidential run but she simply accomplished exactly the opposite of most of them right after being re-elected. She promised to lower oil's price – the price had a great increase shortly after the election and has been like this since then. She promised to resume the increase of economy – Brazil faces its worst economic crisis, with two following years of recession. She promised to control inflation – the target ceiling was surpassed, and now inflation is at 9.0%, its worst result since 2003. She promised not to increase interest rate – the basic interest rate (Selic) is currently 14.25%, since inflation is forcing its increase. She promised not to increase energy bill – since her re-election, the electric energy's price had increased 44.75%. She also promised many other things, as written in her government plan, presented during the election, containing around 55 promises.

Besides all these unaccomplished campaign promises, since they didn't fully depend on the President's willing, another big trouble led to the massive dissatisfaction with Rousseff: the "pedaling taxes", or the financial maneuver to hide the poor reality behind Brazilian economic situation, presenting lower expenses to a lured society and National Treasury. This is the main accusation against Rousseff on the impeachment process – crime of fiscal responsibility – and that's why people are complaining about the legitimacy of it, as some don't consider "pedaling taxes" a crime because it is a common practice in nowadays' politic sphere. Many Governors from Brazilian states had already practiced this bureaucratic failure, which implies in luring the Treasury by hiding real accounting data, intending to divert public funds to finance the unfortunately endemic corruption. As a result, the main excuse used by Rousseff's defense is that the practice is not illegal and that accusation is not only irresponsible but also an attempt to force a new government over the democratically elected one. Let's be clear: according to the Criminal Code, the "pedaling taxes" practices are implied under the crime of financial statement makeup – a variation of crime of fiscal responsibility -, liable on conviction of one or two years of prison. Also, it can be inferred from the Law n. 1,079, from 04/10/1950, that the President, if caught breaking the Budget Law, can be convicted of its crime and evicted from the Head Office. Finally, the accusation against Rousseff is not an illegitimate attempt of coup, but a real crime committed by her and her political allies, and it must be punished according to what the law says.