During the Festival of Ideas organized by Caracol Radio and Prisa Media in Villa de Leyva, former Finance Minister Mauricio Cárdenas assured that President Gustavo Petro will not respect the budget rule, also reaffirming that difficult in economic terms, the time for is approaching the country closer.
The former minister took part in the panel “Technocracy vs. Ideology Amid Political Polarization,” moderated by Caracol Radio Information Services Director Alfonso Ospina, to explain his theory about what lies ahead for the country.
“What does the rule say? Colombia has a public debt of 60% of GDP, it needs to reduce this to 55% of GDP to avoid excessive debt. What did President Petro say? – I inherited that, I don’t like it, I’m not completely convinced, but I’ll comply – a little reluctantly, because he knows that if he says he won’t comply, the whole world will collapse raiding the markets, the rating agencies, etc.,” he said.
And he explained, “What do I think is going to happen? Honestly, at the end of the day he won’t fulfill it, and I’ll tell you why; The economy is slowing down brutally, it is like an internal current, when this emerges and becomes a very dominant force, the country will not talk about whether there is complete peace or whether there are the scandals that come to light every week The country will say – we are in a crisis, we have to get out of this crisis – and this crisis will not be solved by cutting interest rates because it is very deep, it is a crisis of confidence because the government’s message was very simple: The State can do everything, the state is able to manage health, pensions and public services, no more models like 4G, we are able to manage the roads, moreover, no highways are needed, but tertiary roads are needed – that is the vision, that is the ideology of the government, the businessman, the investor says, hey, these are not the conditions that are conducive to investment, and the consumer, the household, recognizes that and says that will be fine you see , that the polls are falling, they will lower interest rates, the Bank of the Republic will lower them later, but that will not reactivate, then a strong, negative period in economic issues is coming.
The former official explained that President Petro must look for tools to “survive politically” until 2026.
“What will the president do, what tools does he have and how will he try to survive politically until 2026?” with the spending, but not with the spending that we have to do, like educational institutions, hospitals, no, because that is difficult , that requires a method of carrying out the execution, the tool will be money transfers, that’s what’s coming in Colombia, more transfers, more money,” he indicated.
He said that to do so, Petro would have to sacrifice financial goals.
“To do it you just have to sacrifice fiscal targets, so I’m not optimistic. I believe we are wrong in the path we are taking, but to correct that we need a president who says, “I will give up.” Twitter and I will move on.” next to the agreement – because in that agreement, a number of points must then be negotiated, number one of which will be that the private sector is not responsible for all of Colombia’s ills, the private sector has contributed to many solutions to Colombia’s problems, the private sector must be part of the solution to this economic crisis, in which we will find ourselves (…) then President Petro will be able to bring about this change, to change his perspective on politics and to move to a more pragmatic model, because everyone will have their own theory and judge it, there I’m a little skeptical, but that’s why we have to start from now on to lay a little bit the foundations of a national agreement that will certainly leave us behind. This controversy is behind us (…) no longer about the peace agreement, we have to put that behind us, now we have to agree on the future of Colombia, it is about the future. There is too much at stake, he assured.
