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Expelling Dirceu Restores Congress's Dignity, Says Brazil's Rapporteur |
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Written by Marcela Rebelo
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Thursday, 01 December 2005 |
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Brazilian Deputy Júlio Delgado from the Minas Gerais state PSB party, rapporteur in the Ethics Council of the case involving congressman and former presidential chief of staff José Dirceu, applauded the action taken by his colleagues to expel Dirceu.
Delgado said today that the decision to revoke Dirceu's mandate represents an "acknowledgment that there was a bad relationship between the Legislature and the Executive for two and a half years and that it was necessary to restore at least a modicum of the House's dignity."
In his opinion, the revocation of the former presidential chief of staff's mandate should not be a cause for celebration. "To solicit that a legislator be deprived of his political rights for eight years and of a mandate won at the polls is never satisfactory, and there is nothing to be commemorated in this."
By a vote of 293 to 192, the Chamber of Deputies decided in the wee hours of this morning to revoke Dirceu's mandate.
Delgado also said that he was surprised by the number of deputies who voted against revoking Dirceu's mandate, and he noted that "a solid effort" had been made "to try to save Dirceu's mandate."
"We have to admit that it was an assiduous job, to which José Dirceu had a right, but recognize that the delaying tactics were precisely to gain more time to achieve this result, reducing the difference in the vote count."
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