Peruvian cabinet and Premier Zeballos present their plan for the next 18 months

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 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, President Vizcarra closed Congress and called for parliamentary elections. The new parliamentary elections will be held in January 2020.

Infrastructure, scientific investigation, generic drugs and antitrust measures

The presented laws cover infrastructure (5 billion extra financial space to continue 867 public work), 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 control mechanisms of mergers and acquisitions.

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 raise the minimum wage early in 2020. The minimum wage is was already raised from $253 to $277 in March 2018 by former President Kuczynski. Premier Zeballos is also working on measures for stricter gun control, and more effective detection of illegal weapons.

President Vizcarra hopes that new members of parliament will have the capacity to approve the laws and reforms to improve living standards and strengthen democracy.  To encourage transparency in the upcoming elections, in December the government is to launch a Candidates Monitoring Platform providing information on candidates concerning corruption, drug trafficking, and terrorism. 

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.”

Source: Peruvian Times