Brazil’s crisis shows new regional reality

(Photo: Eraldo Peres – AP)

There’s a little-noticed development that says a lot about the rapid demise of Latin America’s leftist populist bloc: Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff’s government is falling apart, and none of the region’s major diplomatic groups is coming to its rescue.

Rousseff’s government suffered a potentially fatal blow this week when the centrist PMDB party of Vice President Michel Temer left the ruling coalition, leaving Rousseff’s Workers Party with a minority in Congress. That paves the way for a congressional impeachment of the president for allegedly breaking spending laws. The process is very likely to result in her ouster.

Rousseff says the congressional effort to impeach her is a “coup against democracy, ” and her authoritarian leftist allies in Venezuela, Ecuador, and Bolivia have strongly supported her claim.

Even before the latest developments, Bolivian President Evo Morales had called for an urgent summit of the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR) — a Quito, Ecuador-based diplomatic bloc — in Brasilia to “defend” Rousseff’s beleaguered government. Venezuela and Ecuador have supported the plan, denouncing the impeachment process as a coup against Rouseff.

To continue reading this article click The Miami Herald