The richest ‘must pay debt of the fuel fund in new tax reform’

After Ecopetrol reported the balances of the fuel price stabilization (FECP) with a cut to June 2025 (between January 2022 and half of this year it has received from the nation the payment of $ 72.8 billion), President Gustavo Petro said that paying said account with budgetary resources (from the Nation)“It is one of the greatest fiscal policy errors in recent times“

For the president, that debt “It should not have established“In addition, he held former president Iván Duque for supporting the wealthiest families in the country:”Duke’s obsession to maintain the support of the richest sectors of society and the upper middle class led to an aberration in the budget to fight COVID. Billions of pesos of the treasury were delivered as a subsidy to the richest in the country, while poverty shot at levels that constitute a historical record and that my government is substantially lowering”

See more: $ 72.8 billion has received Ecopetrol for payment of balances from the fuel fund

For Petro, the measures taken in the previous government were not successful: “This social policy upside down of Duke, has no paragon in the world. Countries knew how to dominate covid without increasing poverty. The thesis of Uribismo to put the State at the service of the most powerful, which was already applied for more than a century, at the time of the virus, exploded society. That is why today I am its president“

In addition to this, the president argued that the gasoline deficit left by Duke should not be paid, since he had been bought at very high international prices, while in the country he sold at low prices, “With the budget. That constituted an unconstitutional subsidy, which the Court, let. Implemented by Restrepo and Ocampo, and followed by Bonilla, is one of the worst economic policy errors, and is responsible for the fiscal deficit“

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Therefore, he said, when he knew he opposed this policy, and made the decision to match national prices with internationals, “closing the gap. But the damage was done. In no country in the world, there must be subsidies to hydrocarbons. It is a matter of life or death“

On the other hand, the president indicated that the gasoline deficit had to be paid by gasoline users and that this involved having a long -term payment plan “based on the price of gasoline. Which would have led to a transit greater to the electric mobility that humanity and life today require urgently,“

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In addition, Petro said that those who were paying such debt were the poorest sectors of society, through the General Budget of the Nation, “the Gasoline of the richest, for more than $ 70 billion, must be paid in the new tax reform by the richest of society, And if Congress opposes, for gasoline prices. It is a matter of social status of law and justice“

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Thus, said the president, You can end the fiscal deficit that Colombia has; According to his government, the Congress of the Republic will propose itin addition to “a generalized reduction of income tax for companies“

Valentina Delgadillo Abello
Portfolio journalist