Government Was Slow to Realize the Gravity of the Crisis, Rousseff Says

08/25/2015 - 08h55

President Dilma Rousseff said on Monday (24) that the government failed when it just came to realize that the economic crisis was much bigger than expected between the months of November and December last year -after she had already been re-elected.

In an interview with Folha and other two newspapers, Rousseff said that the administrative reform announced by the Presidential Palace will cut, apart from ten ministries, a thousand of the approximately 22,500 positions of trust existing nowadays.

The President recognizes that the changes will bring political difficulty, but said it is necessary to do them. "We will come clean on all ministries", she said.

Rousseff made a strong defense of two of her main political allies: Vice President Michel Temer (PMDB), who gave back to the president part of the political articulation, and the former President Lula da Silva.

When asked about the sentence spoken by her vice, on the need that "someone" could reunify the country, the PT (Worker´s Party) politician said there was a lot of "intrigue" in the air. "He is extremely loyal to me", she said. "The first phase of the political articulation [with the approval of the fiscal adjustment] is a success."

About Lula, the president said that she doesn´t think it´s "right" to have "attitudes of trying to diminish him".

"They have gone beyond all limits", she said, referring to the bomb dropped against the Lula Institute and the dummy of the former president in the demonstrations of August 16, when he was depicted with inmate clothing.

For the PT president, acts of intolerance are unacceptable and "fascists". Rousseff also said that no one can stop the Lava Jato process, the operation that investigates corruption scheme at Petrobras, but argued that the more rapid and effective the investigations are, the better.

Translated by DENISE MOTA

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	Pedro Ladeira/Folhapress
	Dilma Rousseff speaks during an interview with Folha and other two newspapers