BRASILIA, Brazil �� Brazilian President Michel Temer was set back Sunday in his effort to fend off allegations of corruption and cover-up after the country's influential bar association voted in favor of his impeachment.
The council of Brazil's Order of Lawyers (OAB by its Brazilian acronym) voted 25-1 in favor of an impeachment hearing, and will file its request in the lower house of Congress in coming days, it said Sunday. The OAB says Temer did not denounce criminal activities, broke with presidential decorum, and promised favors to individuals.
Temer's press office didn't reply to requests for comment.
"We are going to ask for the impeachment of another president of the republic, the second in a year and four months," OAB President Claudio Lamachia said in a statement posted on the group's website. Temer's predecessor, Dilma Rousseff, was impeached and removed from office last year.
Temer attempted in a televised speech Saturday to discredit evidence that Prosecutor General Rodrigo Janot says shows the president engaging in a cover-up and possibly passive corruption. Janot this month obtained Supreme Court authorization to investigate Temer, according to court documents made public Friday.
Underlying the investigation is a recording made by JBS Chairman Joesley Batista in March in which he and Temer allegedly discuss payoffs and influence trafficking. Temer says he met with Batista but denies wrongdoing, saying the evidence was doctored.
