‘Brazil’s new all-white, all-male government shows what’s at stake’
The new cabinet represents something that is very different from Rousseff’s government that was previously representing Brazil's culturally diverse people, Carlos Affonso, Director of the Institute of Technology and Society in Rio de Janeiro, told RT.
As thousands have been protesting across Brazil against the Senate's decision to impeach President Rousseff, the vice president, Michel Temer, has taken over power as interim president, RT discussed with expert the current situation in Brazil.
RT: Michel Temer is less popular among Brazilians than Dilma Rousseff. What chance does he have of steadying the ship as interim president?
Carlos Affonso: You have to look first into the process that we are running in the Congress. Even though the interim president Michel Temer is certainly not as popular as he would like to be, the fact is that we have a process running through the Congress for the next six months in which the former president Dilma Rousseff is going to be trialed for budget manipulation. But at the same time the interim president Michel Temer will run the presidency as a full-pledge president for those 180 days. So, even though popularity might not be one of the greatest features of this government, it is pretty sure that we are going to have him as the president for at least those 180 days. And the odds of having the Senate deciding that Dilma Rousseff should return are pretty low. So chances are president Michel Temer will run through the next two years up to the next elections.
RT: Temer reportedly has a lot of support on Wall Street. What with that and the supposed intelligence links, does Washington have his back?
CA: At the same time it is clear to everyone that the all-male, all-white cabinet represents something that is totally different from Dilma Rousseff’s government was representing in the last years. Brazil is an ethnically diverse and mixed country. And for you to have an all-male, all-white cabinet definitely shows a lot on what is at stake for this new government. One thing that is important for this discussion is that the cables that WikiLeaks has released date back from 2006. So, at this time our current president was a federal representative, so he was not a member of the government at that time. But it might show some leads forward for this government. It is important to say the program of this new government is called “Bridges to the Future” and it has a very progressive stance when it comes to applying to the privatization of public companies and that might be one of the leads on what this new government is up to for the upcoming months.
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.
