In a video published shortly after the General Assembly approved the 2021 budget, Bukele assured that the minimum pension would be increased this year. According to the political opposition, the increase should be reflected in the payment from January 14.
“It seems they are lying to the population, what is certain is that they don’t want money right now, they are refusing the money for the minimum pension increase and it’s not in the nation’s budget this year,” said he. Representative René Portillo Cuadra, from ARENA, last night after President Nayib Bukele sent four vetoes to the Assembly, including funding to raise the minimum pension of nearly 200,000 Salvadorans.
Despite the fact that the initiative to increase the minimum pension from $ 207 to $ 304 per month came from the People’s Assembly, Bukele launched it as a bet from his government in a video he published on his Twitter account on December 28, in which he An allusion to the vetoes he would do and assured that the minimum pension increase would not be affected, placing it within the 2021 budget as a concrete fact, but he vetoed the funding to enact it feed.
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“In an unprecedented act, the President of the Republic opposes the increase of the minimum pension from $ 207 to $ 304, it is a totally inexplicable and unheard of fact against the population most in need of a decent pension. Their stance is not justified because this money went directly to fund the people who need it most, no one lives on a $ 207 pension, instead $ 300 came to kick the economic situation retirees are facing, now they add even more. poverty because the president denied them a decent pension, ”said Portillo Cuadra.
But not only the increase in the minimum pension will be affected by Bukele’s vetoes. According to FMLN deputy Yanci Urbina, the general budget of the nation as a whole is at risk.
“ Any part of that budget that is deducted puts the whole budget in a complicated situation because it cannot leave the payment to the municipalities without funding and what seems more serious to us is trying to leave the minimum pension increase without funding, Incidentally, this increase must be applied to pensioners between 14 and 21 January, ”says Urbina.
In this regard, the FMLN deputy, Víctor Hugo Suazo, explained that from this day on, retirees should receive their minimum pension increased to $ 304.
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“The retirees of the ISSS or the INPEP or the private system should complain because this hike has to be applied from this month, that’s part of the budget clearances and we hope it will go into effect because that’s clearly an approval that this Assembly promoted the economy of the families, ”Urbina deepens.
Suazo added that with Bukele’s right of veto, national spending for this year remains “unbalanced”, which contradicts the constitution and the Court’s rulings, which require the government to maintain a 100% funded budget. to have.
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“It is clearly unconstitutional, the budget balance required by the Constitution is not maintained, any citizen can make a claim of unconstitutionality and the House must recognize that claim and can request as a precaution that the budget should not enter into force (2021),” he stressed. . Suazo and even added that the Constitutional Chamber could issue a follow-up resolution on existing rulings on the matter.
In Bukele’s veto against Decree 803 on the funding of the minimum pension, he notes that he rejected it because the $ 250 million loan with the IDB approved by the Assembly was originally intended to “ increase the efforts and actions of the Government of the Republic, to stem the health crisis resulting from COVID-19 and the country’s economic recovery, ”despite the fact that the government has already used more than $ 1 billion of the $ 2 billion authorized the Assembly to combat the pandemic.