12:01 AM
A blow to the jugular was received by the health reform of President Gustavo Petro and not even the palliative care that was attempted at the last minute to save it served for the Conservative and La U parties to maintain their support.
After two meetings of more than four hours, carried out separately by these communities, both notified this Wednesday that they do not support the project filed by Minister Carolina Corcho on February 13 before the Chamber.
This situation began in the afternoon, when the Casa de Nariño sent these two parties the text of the project presentation. But that document was exactly the same one that had caused annoyance in the Liberal Party and that caused the former president and sole leader of that party to decide to distance himself from the reform. He even said that he will present his own initiative under the figure of statutory law and it is not ruled out that they end up supporting the blues and the U.
In fact, the president of the Conservative Party, Senator Efraín Cepeda, announced that the Goths were breaking off talks with the government, considering that holding more meetings would be a “waste of time.”
And, for its part, the Partido de la U also got off the boat, leaving the Historical Pact and the Palace practically alone in their crusade to reform the health system. This was confirmed by its president, Dilian Francisca Toro, minutes after Cepeda’s announcement.
“After receiving the presentation of the health reform project, we found that the agreed agreements are not contemplated, for which we will present an alternate presentation that includes the proposals presented by the parties to save lives,” said Toro.
With the withdrawal of the Liberal, Conservative and U parties, the health reform receives a hook to the jaw and runs out of oxygen in Congress. A look at the accounts to process the initiative exposes the crisis that the Ministry in charge of Corcho is experiencing. Will he resign after failure?
Of 106 senators, only 40 – those of the Historical Pact – are unconditional to Petro. In contrast, now the Government faces the refusal of 15 from the Conservative Party, 13 from the Liberal Party and 10 from La U. That is, 38 congressmen who, added to the 24 opposition members gathered in Cambio Radical and the Democratic Center, are enough to be a majority and give the holy oils to the initiative.
The outlook in the Chamber is also discouraging. Of 188 representatives, about 69 could be considered as squires without objection from Petro. However, the counterweight bloc that Liberals (33), Conservatives (26) and La U (16) would do would be enough to outnumber them (75) and leave the articulated one on the canvas. So it is almost a fact that the 34 votes of the opposition (Democratic Center and Radical Change) would be at the service of that crusade.
In light of these accounts, it is clear that the virtual collapse of the health reform would represent another blow to the Petro coalition, despite the fact that the president of the Chamber, David Racero, said that he still believed that a agreement.
In any case, the first bell to break the coalition was just last week with the failure of the political reform. Will the collapse of the health be the final blow?
Now, the political and medical country awaits Petro’s reaction to a situation that is a severe blow to its political capital, of which it pledged a large amount to support its minister Corcho.
Even so, this could be a situation that the president takes advantage of to argue that Congress did not let him make the change to the system and thus put pressure on the streets with the announced ‘balconazo’ on May 1 and other dates. Meanwhile, the official collapse of the health reform would take place after Easter and the question remains as to what will happen to the labor and pension.