RIO DE JANEIRO—A Brazilian minister resigned on Friday amid allegations that he enlisted President Michel Temer’s help to pressure a fellow Cabinet member to approve a luxury apartment development project in a preservation zone.
The announcement feeds a growing scandal over alleged misuse of power that threatens Temer’s presidency only six months after he replaced a predecessor ousted from office by Congress—and at a time corruption investigations have tarred many senior politicians.
At least one opposition party says it will submit a motion to impeach the new president.
Temer, who is deeply unpopular with many Brazilians, has been struggling to push through an ambitious austerity agenda he says will pull Latin America’s largest economy out of its worst recession in decades. Since May, his administration has lurched from one scandal to the next, but until now, none had directly implicated the president.
Temer’s administration “just turned six months and it already looks old,” Fabio Zanini, political editor of the daily newspaper Folha de S.Paulo, wrote Friday. “The strategy to win popular legitimacy with an economic recovery and political stability is quickly sinking for a president who was not supported by the popular vote.”
