After the scandals of alleged corruption of the National Risk and Disaster Management Unit of Colombia, it was now known that Congressman Wadith Manzur, representative of the Conservative Party, had himself appointed rapporteur for the project to expand the debt quota, presented by the Ministry of Finance.
Manzur’s name became involved in the controversy because Olmedo López, former director of the Ungrd, said that this congressman “sold out” to the Government.
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In a report by Cambio magazine it was revealed that Manzur had the support of the president of the Third Commission of the Chamber, Carlos Cuenca Chaux, of Cambio Radical. And in turn, Cuenca “blackmailed the Government by demanding $40,000 million for an alleged solar farm in Puerto Carreño in exchange for naming the speakers,” reads the publication of this medium.
In a video, Congressman Cuenca can be heard saying that There is a project for which they are asking for money, in reference to the debt quota.
“If there is money for the park or the Puerto Carreño farm, let’s go, if not, no. Simple vice, see, send it to Ipse, send it wherever you want, send it to the governor, send it to the energy company, that is not my problem. If the money is there, come on, you are asking for $70 billion and they are not going to give us $40,000? No, that has no presentation, that has no presentation. Are we going or not going vice?”, is heard in the audiovisual piece.
Well, in the face of this new scandal, to which more details, characters and facts are known day after day, President Gustavo Petro spoke out on his X (Twitter) account, where he assured that The debt quota project is not money for the Government, since his administration has not been getting into debt since they began to govern.
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Clarified that The debt quota is to pay the current debt with new debt, “hopefully cheaper.” And he recalled that this strategy is what previous governments have always done to alleviate debt and not let public investment fall.
“If the third commissions do not approve the project, either there is a cessation of payments or I have to declare an economic emergency. I won’t hesitate to do it. So I invite the third commissions to fiscal responsibility,” warned the national president.
Therefore, he reiterated that Government and opposition in Congress must unite in this project and purpose to cushion public finances. And he added: “Solar farms are not under pressure. “They should be placed in all the municipalities of the country.”
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What is the debt quota about?
It must be remembered that the Ministry of Finance presented to Congress a request for urgent processing to advance with the bill that seeks to expand the debt quota national, up to 17,607 million dollars.
This would be paid with the money that the Government will have available between 2024 and 2026. and for that it needs to make the famous fiscal rule more flexible.
The accumulated total of successive authorizations conferred by Congress, since 1999amount to 70 billion dollars to date, mentioned the office headed by Ricardo Bonilla.
This morning Bonilla himself addressed the controversy and noted that the Government has complete confidence that the Congress of the Republic will approve the debt quota before June 20 as has happened historically in each administration.
“The objective of this initiative is to have the space for external credit operations that allows continuing to comply with the Financial Plan, the National Budget Law and the external debt service. as expressed by the President of the Republic, Gustavo Petro. The commitment to continue complying with obligations in the local and external public debt market and the Fiscal Rule on a path of sustainability is reiterated,” emphasized the head of the Treasury portfolio.
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The ministry has insisted that the Expansion of debt quota takes into account debt service projections, the current financial planthe fiscal balance deficit assumptions presented in the Medium-Term Fiscal Framework and the laws and legislative acts presented and approved by the Congress of the Republic such as the Fiscal Rule Law and the constitutional criterion of Fiscal Sustainability.
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The Minister of Finance explained that the advantage of this credit is that it is cheap and therefore “he cannot think about doing a ‘rollover’ (renegotiation of terms) with that credit, it makes no sense.”
On the other hand, he assured, it has a disadvantage and that is that “This credit does not qualify in the debt quota that the Government has approved and that is important because even if the credit is paid, it does not expand the quota”he added.
