Lasso asks Ecuador’s Parliament to urgently process economic reforms

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Ecuadorian President Guillermo Lasso, went to the National Assembly (Parliament) this Friday to personally present the “Law for the Creation of Opportunities”, a legal project for urgent processing that contains reforms in the tax, labor, and investment areas.

In a special ceremony held in the hall of the legislative plenary, the President asked the congressmen to put aside ideological positions and eventual personal quarrels to move forward with the passage of the bill.

With the urgency character in economic matters, the Assembly will have one month to process the project since a delay in this term would imply entering into force by force or the rule of law.

Lasso, in the ceremony of delivery of the project, where he was accompanied by his wife, his closest collaborators, several legislators, and a group of young supporters from the bars of the parliamentary hemicycle, insisted on the postulates that led him to formulate the normative body and that he had already advanced the day before in a message to the nation.

The President indicated that only 3 out of 10 Ecuadorians belonging to the Economically Active Population (EAP) have a formal job. In this context, the economy suffers from severe distortions such as a bulky fiscal deficit of more than 7,000 million dollars.

Likewise, the country’s foreign debt exceeds US$63 billion, 63 percent of GDP, which makes it difficult to undertake an economic reactivation after a period of a pandemic that has aggravated the financial situation, which was already in crisis.

Among the reforms, Lasso proposed to debate in the Assembly is one in the tax area aimed at eliminating several taxes. He made it clear that he will not raise the Value Added Tax (VAT) circulated by social networks.

He will also ask for a higher contribution to Ecuadorians who have incomes over 24,000 dollars a year, assets over 500,000 dollars, and companies over one million.

Likewise, he asked the Assembly to process his labor reforms, which imply new hiring models for new employees; since he assured that he would not stop the rights acquired until now.

“The reforms are from here on, never backward”, assured the President, who considered that his project is essential to undertake policies aimed at combating unemployment, poverty, and child malnutrition, whose rate in Ecuador is one of the highest in the region.

The President reiterated his request for legislators to pay attention to his project because, he said, “Ecuadorian society demands it”.