President Martin Vizcarra enacted several pieces of legislation yesterday and announced Premier Vicente Zeballos’s government plan for the remaining 18 months of this administration.
Zeballos presented his plan to local and regional authorities at the government palace, 30 days after he was sworn in as premier when Congress denied a vote of confidence to his predecessor, Salvador del Solar. Ordinarily, Zeballos would have presented his plan to Congress but on the same day he was sworn in, Vizcarra closed Congress and called for parliamentary elections, to be held in January 2020.
Infrastructure, scientific investigation, generic drugs and antitrust measures
The laws, enacted as urgent decrees, cover infrastructure (freeing up the financing of 867 public works that have been stalled nationwide, for around $5 billion), incentives for investment in scientific investigation and technological innovation, mandatory public access to generic medicines at all drugstores, tax incentives for investment funds investing in real estate, and antitrust measures to ensure prior control of mergers and acquisitions.
“We consider it pertinent to establish a tool that permits the evaluation of operations that are above a certain threshold and prohibit or constrain those that affect the economic efficiency of the markets,” Zeballos said.
The legislation was published Oct. 31 in the official gazette, El Peruano.
Universal health coverage, higher minimum wage, stricter gun control
Zeballos plans to present additional urgent decrees in the next several weeks to create universal health coverage and a proposal to the National Labor Council to raise the minimum wage early in 2020. The minimum wage is currently at S/ 930 ($277), raised in March 2018 by President Kuczynski from S/ 850.
The Executive is also working on measures for stricter gun control, and more effective detection of illegal weapons.
President Vizcarra hoped lawmakers elected in three months will have the capacity to approve laws and reforms to improve living standards and strengthen institutions and democracy. To encourage transparency and good choices in the extraordinary parliamentary elections, in December the government is to launch a Candidates Monitoring Platform providing key information “on any criminal procedures for corruption, drug trafficking and terrorism” on the candidates.
On corruption, the President said the country “cannot grow sustainably with this scourge, just as terrorism did in the past. Today, corruption is one of the main burdens and obstacles to development.”
