'They want to convict an innocent'

Brazil's President Dilma Rousseff fought for her political life yesterday, lobbying lawmakers to defeat a looming impeachment vote while lashing out at "corrupt" critics seeking to oust her.

On the eve of the vote in the lower house of Congress, the 68-year-old leftist leader published a searing column reaffirming her belief that she was the victim of a "coup."

"They want to convict an innocent woman and save the corrupt," Rousseff wrote in the daily Folha de Sao Paulo. The political crisis is threatening to destabilize Latin America's biggest economy as it struggles through a crippling recession and prepares to host the Rio Olympics in four months.

Pro- and anti-Rousseff rallies are planned in all major cities today.

Rousseff faces charges that she illegally used creative accounting to mask government shortfalls during her 2014 reelection. She accepts the accusations but defends her behavior by saying that previous governments used similar measures.

The pro-impeachment camp appears to have the two-thirds majority -- 342 out of 513 votes -- needed to pass the impeachment motion up to the Senate, according to a tally by Brazilian newspapers.

If that happens, Rousseff will be sent to trial in the Senate in a process expected to last months.