Lower popularity does not make a hard job any easier
It seems like a long time ago that President Lasso enjoyed his highest levels of popularity, when over 70% of Ecuadorians approved of his performance, back in August 2021. By the end of January, his popularity had fallen below 40%. In this context Lasso is facing strong opposition outside and inside the Assembly, with the newly formed majority of 70 legislators from UNES, part of Pachakutik, and Social Christians trying to put the president up against the wall.
The past week was an especially active one for legislators, who approved an amnesty for those accused of violence and destruction of property during the riots of October 2019. Among them are Leonidas Iza and Jaime Vargas, leaders of CONAIE. Despite this controversial pardon, Iza is organizing a protest for March 22 against the privatization of water resources and the mining companies that pollute them.
This same week, the Assembly brought back to life a bill to increase teachers’ salaries that had been approved one day before the second-round presidential election of last year. The new bill is far less aggressive, proposing an increase of around $500m compared to $2b in the first one. President Lasso intends to come to an agreement with the sector on a lower and more gradual increase.
At the same time, President Lasso is in the middle of a dialog with unions and social representatives to discuss the long-delayed labor reform. However, despite the dialog, union leaders have convoked a demonstration for March 23 against this reform and others to the pension plan of the IESS, which is going through a difficult financial and actuarial situation.
The Legislative Administrative Council accepted for discussion a proposal from UNES to derogate the tax reform approved last November. The constitution exclusively grants the executive the initiative on bills of economic substance and the prerogative to propose, approve or veto such bills. Some legislators are using Article 144 of the constitution, which allows the Assembly to discuss and derogate other type of bills, and they are insisting on this matter. But they will have a difficult task ahead to achieve their objective as there is no consensus in the Assembly as how to address the proposal.
Finally, the assembly will have the second debate on the recently submitted bill to attract investment. The bill was approved in first debate but the legislation has suffered several modifications. Approval of this bill requires 70 votes, and the government has secured 40 to approve the original text. It might be the case that legislators include an article to modify the above-mentioned tax reform within this bill. The president has the right to veto the new version, and the Assembly will need 92 votes to ratify its own text. Thus, trying to derogate the tax reform through this path might prove to be a risky bet.
Now read on...
Register to sample a report