HAD we a less servile and more independent parliament, less rooted in unctuous defence of a single person, the dramatic scenes playing out in Brazil right now might have echoed those back home.Both Brazil and SA are deeply mired in corruption scandals which trace all the way back to the highest office in each of the two Brics nations. Here at home, we use the fancy-sounding nomenclature of “state capture”; in São Paulo, the refrain of crony capitalism is the same, only there it relates to looting of the coffers of state-owned PetroBras.But while an impeachment bid for President Jacob Zuma failed at the first hurdle as his party, the ANC, rallied around to defeat the bid this month, Brazil’s Dilma Rousseff was less lucky.Last weekend, Brazil’s congress voted by more than two-thirds to send an impeachment vote for Rousseff to the senate — which she’ll face next month.Not that this suggests Brazil’s politicians are somehow more honourable than ours: a politician is a politician after a...
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