Colombian President Gustavo Petro assured, this Monday, May 1, that in the country “people have no rights“nor freedom, it is”a people who have been condemned to one of the greatest social inequalities on Earth“, which has caused there to be “many fundamental unsatisfied needs“.
(See: Petro’s request: that the country mobilize for “exchange reforms”).
In the act of possession of seven nine ministersreplacing those who left last week in the first major crisis in his cabinet, the president took the opportunity to launch a plea for his social reforms with which it seeks to diminish this inequality.
Petro criticized that the last decades “it tried to build that the best way to guarantee the individual and collective rights of society was to allow public money to be mediated by businessmen“.
“The result is that fortunes were accumulated, that there were thefts and ethical disasters around the management of these resources but there was no increase in quality and coverage to ensure that people’s rights are universal.“, he added.
(See: New Petro government ministers took office).
Due, “people today have no rights. If one walks everywhere (…) one finds this social inequality perfectly“, he added. And, “if there is no satisfaction of needs, there is no freedom“, hence Colombia “It is a people without freedom.”
Against this, “a progressive government has to advance in achieving freedoms” and the reforms presented so far “They show which side the government is on.”
The setbacks suffered by the reforms in Congress were one of the triggers the ministerial crisis from last week. For this reason, Petro defended this Monday that “the Government works day and night (…) the Administration must prepare to work 24 hours a day, respecting labor rights and rest“, which implies having more people working.
(See: Petro’s trusted ministers: who remains in office).
“We are not going to pass this Government with the concern that we let time pass, that we did not do what we had to do,” stressed the head of state.
Marches of May 1.
TIME
The president stressed that “agrarian reform is one of the most important, one of the fundamental policies of social change in Colombia“while criticized that”the national budget does not redistribute wealth, it does not serve for social equity“And that is why it also has to be reformed.
Finally, he went the new Minister of Health, Guillermo Jaramillo, to stress that “the change in the ministry does not change the essence of the project” of reform of the health of its predecessor, Carolina Cork, that has been the cause of deep national controversy, so it has a “strong task” of winning support in Congress.
(See: ‘Private pension funds no longer finance the Nation’: Petro).
EFE
