Majority of Brazilians want Rousseff, Temer and Cunha to step down

A poll by Datafolha found that 61% of respondents want the impeachment of President Dilma Rousseff and 63% rated her administration as “poor” or “terrible”, 24% as “average”, and 13% as “excellent” or “good”.

The president's standing has improved on both levels compared to the previous poll conducted last month, when  68% of respondents had been favorable to impeachment, and 69% had given negative ratings to the government. The poll prompted mixed reactions among pro-government and opposition members of Congress.

According to Afonso Florence, leader of the ruling Workers' Party (PT) at the Chamber of Deputies, the results suggest that rejection of Rousseff's government is decreasing. But Antonio Imbassahy, leader of the opposition's PSDB party at the lower house, the population's attitude to the government remains negative and has no influence on the course of the impeachment proceedings.

The poll, conducted on April 7 and 8 and published on the Sunday edition (Apr. 10) of Folha de S.Paulo newspaper, showed that 60% of respondents want the resignation of both Rousseff and Vice-President Michel Temer. His impeachment is supported by 58% of respondents.

The standing of the Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies, Eduardo Cunha, was also low. According to Datafolha, 73% of respondents think he should resign, and 77% support his removal.

2018 Election

The Datafolha poll revealed that voters' preference for former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in a scenario of the 2018 presidential election has picked up again. In the four scenarios presented to respondents, Lula (Workers' Party) was the choice of between 21% and 22% of respondents. The candidate of the Sustainability Network (REDE) party, Marina Silva, was a close competitor to Lula, with voting intentions ranging from 16% to 23%, depending on the PSDB candidate picked for the election scenario.

In all the scenarios proposed by pollsters, the preference for a PSDB candidate was lower than in previous polls. Compared to December 2015, for example, Aécio Neves, the runner-up in the 2014 presidential election, slid 10 percentage points in voters' preference, going from 27% to 17% of the vote. Geraldo Alckmin, the incumbent governor of São Paulo state, went down five percentage points over the same period (14% to 9%); and Senator José Serra was down 4 percentage points (15% to 11%).

Translated by Mayra Borges