How to cope with Brazil’s political crisis

WHEN Michel Temer took over as Brazil’s president from Dilma Rousseff, who was impeached last August, no one saw him as a clean break from the grubby past. Members of both his Party of the Brazilian Democratic Movement and Ms Rousseff’s Workers’ Party are being investigated or have been convicted in the (Car Wash) probes into scandals centred on Petrobras, the state-run energy company. The difference is that Mr Temer, a more adept politician than Ms Rousseff, is pushing through vital economic reforms that she failed to advance. That is why new accusations of wrongdoing by the president are unsurprising but bad for Brazil.It is unclear whether Mr Temer has committed any crimes. The new allegations come from Joesley Batista, a meat mogul, who was being pursued by prosecutors in several corruption cases (see ). Angling for a plea bargain, Mr Batista wired himself up for a late-night meeting with the president. He has produced a tape in which Mr Temer appears to endorse the payment of hush money to a convicted politician and to hear without objection Mr Batista’s tales of obstructing justice. In separate testimony a subordinate claimed that Mr Temer had received bribes; a confidant of Mr Temer was filmed with a bag stuffed with 500,000 reais ($153,000).