Brazilian President Michel Temer acknowledged on Monday that he may not have the votes at present to pass his pension reform bill in the lower house of Congress, and the key measure for fiscal savings might not face a floor vote until late May.
Violence has erupted in Brazil at the end the country's first general strike in more than 20 years. Buses and cars have been set on fire in Rio de Janeiro's city centre while roads blocks set up by activists were also ablaze and some shops were vandalized.
Public transport largely came to a halt across much of Brazil on Friday as protesters blocked roads and scuffled with police in a general strike to protest proposed changes to labor laws and the pension system. It is the first general strike in over two decades.
President Michel Temer insists that a growing corruption scandal in his government will not paralyze Brazil as it struggles to emerge from its deepest recession in history. “Brazil doesn’t stop,” he said in an interview broadcast on Spanish television TVE ahead of a visit Monday by Spain’s Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy. “So it won’t be corrupt acts that paralyze the country.”
Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy arrived in Brazil on Sunday on an official two-day visit during which he will meet with President Michel Temer and follow a markedly economic agenda, including Mercosur and current ongoing talks with the EU in Brussels. The second leg of the trip will take Rajoy to Uruguay.
Economic activity in Brazil grew in February at the fastest pace since January 2010, a central bank indicator showed this week, in the strongest sign yet that Latin America's largest economy is emerging from a two-year recession. Bumper harvests are expected to have lifted agricultural production in the first quarter of the year, while industrial output improved on a pickup in car exports.
Brazilian President Michel Temer on Tuesday made new concessions to ease passage of an unpopular pension reform bill, leading police unions to try and invade Congress in the latest angry demonstration from a labor group.
A United States judge on Monday sentenced Brazilian engineering company Odebrecht SA to pay US$2.6 billion in fines in a massive criminal corruption case, signing off on a plea deal between the company and U.S., Brazilian and Swiss authorities.
An institutional and political earthquake is shaking Brazil: the Supreme Court has opened corruption investigations into nine ministers, three governors, 24 senators, 39 members of the Lower House and other elected officials totaling at least 108 politicians, according to a report published on Tuesday by O Estado de Sao Paulo.
Brazilian President Michel Temer plans to water down its landmark pension reform proposal to ease lawmakers' resistance to the controversial bill key to rebalance the government's depleted finances. Temer said in a radio interview on Thursday he has authorized the lawmaker sponsoring the plan to alter its terms as long as he maintains the bill's minimum retirement age. He did not specify what changes could take place.