US$3,500 millions are not enough for any country, and if the availability of an amount of that size is within the possibilities of a nation, what its citizens would expect is that it be invested in basic needs (See analysis) such as education, security, food and —perhaps— a frontal fight against an enemy that shakes us every year and strips us like Statechildhood anemia.
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Precisely, one of the questions in the latest Ipsos survey for América Televisión graphs the feelings of citizens. For 92% of those surveyed, there are other priorities in the country other than the purchase of 24 war planes. Only 5% defend waste.
But the Government of Dina Boluarte has closed ranks in defending the acquisition. Could this be one of the reasons why the results of the Ipsos survey are also devastating for the president? It only stands with 4% approval.
While this is happening in the Palace, in the Ministry of Defense, headed by Walter Astudillo, they are already preparing to face a possible questioning in Congress for the madness of acquiring war planes to face a future war scenario that at this moment is only being fought on the desks of Minister Astudillo, Premier Gustavo Adrianzén and the head of the Air Force, Carlos Chávez.
The interest in ensuring that this multimillion-dollar purchase does not fall is not only in the Executive, the distributors and representatives of those who would benefit from US$3.5 billion have also stepped up and have started a fierce communication campaign accompanied by attacks of all kinds. .
Fortunata Palomino, president of the Network of Common Pots of Lima.
The priority is the security of the country, food security. Those people who are closing small businesses are closing their doors because they do not have security and because of extortion, blackmail, they are closing, they are going to another country.
What I think we should invest in is our children, education, and health, which should be paramount. It seems vanity to me.
We have a budget of S/1.69 per beneficiary and S/144 million per year for the more than 350 thousand families that exist nationwide.
I know that the president has to take the baths of popularity, but I don’t know if it is popularity with these purchases and leaving aside the people who demand justice, who demand to be heard.
Lucio Castro, general secretary of SUTEP
Every time the Government must respect the law and the Constitution for the benefit of workers or fulfill its obligations with sectors such as Education, it responds: there is no money. However, today they intend to spend more than 14 billion soles on the purchase of weapons that are unnecessary today. The demand now is to give priority to education, health, implement social policies and give attention to the sectors neglected government after government, sectors that today are victims of citizen insecurity.
Such gigantic spending is a waste and irresponsibility on the part of a Government that should ensure the lack of work, the increase in essential products, economic reactivation and combat crime and corruption that affect millions of students who are the pillar of the future of the country.
Pedro Riega, dean of the CMP
I believe that in Peru, there are currently important social and economic gaps, which, if financed, will allow the development of our population and country.
In that sense, limiting ourselves only to the health sector, public spending in Peru represents 3.5% of GDP (7% is the average for Latin America). That is, the budget allocated to hire personnel, maintain health facilities, replace biomedical equipment, purchase medicines, among others, is insufficient compared to what other countries in the region allocate.
According to an official document from the Ministry of Health on infrastructure, it is concluded that more than 90% of establishments require some type of intervention in their infrastructure, either investment or maintenance, depending on the state in which they are located. To date, it has not been quantified how much the budget for this diagnosis amounts to. But if we consider the high-complexity hospital in Piura, there is information that the investment will amount to 650 million dollars through the Government-to-Government modality. So, we can extrapolate that a regional hospital costs no less than S/1.5 billion.
The annual expenditure on health personnel under a placement contract in the health function amounts to 1,799 million soles. Working condition that is unacceptable for health personnel, since to hire this personnel in an organic position would require 680 million.
Finally, while security and defense are important, there are other activities and investments that must be made and are awaiting financing. In that sense, the acquisition of war planes in a country without wars and where other actions of peace and dialogue can be carried out is not pertinent.
Martin Ojeda, Director of the International Chamber of the Transport Industry
It is unprecedented, it seems totally out of logic to us that they intend to spend US$3.5 billion in a country where the war it is having is not an external war, it is an internal war. What we are experiencing here is a State attacked by corruption, negligence and state bureaucracy, attacked by criminals who destroy upon entering the country with acts of extortion and other types of crimes, which destroy any attempt at legal competition in the commercial field.
That money that we must take care of, for an internal budget, for the PNP, to administer education for the Ministry of Agriculture, for the ATU, to build the tracks that we lack, for the negotiation and development of the Tour de Chancay that we do not have, We are going to spend on airplanes. Very strange and dangerous things from a mind that does not know the reality of Peru.
Susana Saldaña, president of the Board of Directors of the Gamarra Peru Business Association
Peru has more urgent needs than spending US$3.5 billion on fighter planes for a war that, barring a catastrophe, is not coming soon.
For example, the president of the Council of Ministers, Gustavo Adrianzén, pointed out that there are no prisons to put criminals. Well, there is the money with which they could build prisons, with which they will buy airplanes for a war that does not exist.
And if you want to directly reactivate the economy, those S/12 billion are a little less than 30% of the total state purchases that the law says should focus on producing mypes.
Instead of playing with the money of all Peruvians, the Government of Dina Boluarte could support, strengthen the economic reactivation of the country and defeat the advance of organized crime and the criminality that plagues us.
Luis Gonzáles Posada, former chancellor
I think, like all Peruvians, that we must hone the operational capacity of the Armed Forces. It’s not just about the Air Force, where they have asked for $3.5 billion to buy warplanes; but it is also, for example, the Army, where all its units are more than 50 years old, as are their artillery; and also the Navy, which has other deficiencies. In other words, we must address the issue as a whole and do so with great consideration in consultation with the Congress of the Republic. And that is not what has been done.
I saw a table about those 3.5 billion dollars and I also saw an order for a presidential plane; None of those things are priorities. Yes, for example, the purchase of helicopters, transport planes and transport planes with firefighting bags are a priority.
The urgency, the priority at this moment, today, is the National Police, because we are facing an unprecedented crime wave and there is a lack of police stations, police officers, the weapons they have are obsolete, as are their vehicles. Hundreds of patrol cars have been decommissioned and are in a car cemetery. That is the urgency, that is the priority for the country. It is necessary for the Police to guarantee citizen safety. And the second priority is the issue of prison construction; It is not possible for there to be prison overpopulation like the one we are suffering from.
If it is the social sphere, what the Government has to do in Parliament is establish national priorities. For example, 90% of health centers have enormous deficiencies, there is a lack of medicines, medical equipment, cutting-edge technology, many schools are in ruins or have deficiencies. The priority is human, to serve the Peruvian population who suffers from this deficiency, the priority is to provide drinking water to the population, because it is not possible that millions of Peruvians do not have it.
I believe that whoever said that there are external threats gave a completely wrong opinion. An expense of that nature cannot be justified due to threats. We have closed the border with Ecuador due to the Brasilia agreements, there is no point to discuss. With Chile also because the last point we had was the maritime delimitation that was finally resolved by a ruling by the Court of The Hague.
It is a mistake for the minister to say that those of us who do not agree with this purchase, because it is not urgent, are traitors to the country. Yes, it is important that the units of the Armed Forces recover, but from there to taking a leap on this issue, there is a very big distance.
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