Brazil’s Temer eyes pro-business plan but has scant room for major reforms

Brazil’s Vice President Michel Temer (C) leaves the house of senator Renan Calheiros (R) as Senator Eunicio Oliveira looks on after a meeting with senators of the Brazilian Democratic Movement Party (PMDB) in Brasilia, Brazil March 28, 2016.

REUTERS/ADRIANO MACHADO

Vice President Michel Temer is quietly assembling a team of respected economists to revive confidence in Brazil’s battered economy with cautious spending cuts and privatizations should leftist President Dilma Rousseff be impeached, insiders say.

Temer could take power as soon as May if the lower house of Congress approves Rousseff’s impeachment but party insiders warn the softly-spoken 75-year-old faces a daunting array of obstacles to pursuing the deeper reforms they say are needed to rebalance Latin America’s largest economy.

Brazil’s worst recession in decades restricts the room for sharp spending cuts to curb a vast budget deficit and differences within Temer’s Brazilian Democratic Movement Party (PMDB) will complicate efforts to build a consensus for change on sensitive issues like pension and welfare reform.

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