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Citizens reject President Ivan Duque's "Economic Growth" bill because it affects the poorest sectors.
Colombia's Congress Thursday began to debate President Ivan Duque's "Economic Growth" bill, a policy package that aims at benefiting big companies, which mobilized hundreds of people to protest at the Bolivar Square in Bogota.
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Through this economic reform, Duque seeks to establish a set of tax exemptions to benefit certain economic sectors.
According to the Finance Ministry, his policies are aimed at making the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) grow between 4 percent and 4.5 percent.
The Colombian Federation of Education Workers (Fecode) denounced that the tax reform disguised as "economic growth law" is just a policy package aimed at improving business competitiveness through tax exemptions to big corporations, which reach up to US$6 billion.
Llevan meses insistiendo en que #PaquetazoDeDuque no existe. Están a punto de aprobar una reforma tributaria lesiva para exprimir el bolsillo de los trabajadores colombianos, incluso, con las movilizaciones en las calles. #12DParoNacional sigue y avanza. pic.twitter.com/MXd1CFYyJk
— fecode (@fecode) 12 de diciembre de 2019
They have been insisting for months that Duque's policy package does not exist. Despite mobilizations in the streets, they are about to pass an injurious tax reform to squeeze the Colombian workers' pockets. Dec. 12 National Strike goes on and on.
"Deploying the same old tale that reducing corporate taxes will generate more jobs, governments have increased citizens' taxes and removed rights for Colombians," Fecode stressed.
Education workers also demanded from Congress that they also demanded that Congress does not ignore the voice of thousands of Colombians "who demand equality, equity, and zero corruption."
There's been already 22 days of protests against the president's neoliberal measures, which harms the country's most vulnerable social groups.
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