Indigenous
organisations and workers' groups in Ecuador
have
vowed to continue protests against President Lenin Moreno's scrapping
of decades-long fuel subsidies. Moreno, who took office in
2017, refused to back down over the austerity policy, imposed under a
deal with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that doubled the
price of fuel overnight and sharply raised gasoline prices. Moreno
told reporters: "Listen clearly. I am not going to change
the measure. The subsidy is finished."
Moreno's
government recently reached a three-year, $4.2bn loan deal with the
IMF, contingent on belt-tightening economic reforms. The
deal allowed Ecuador to receive an immediate disbursement of $652m
and paved the way for an additional $6bn in loans from other
multilateral institutions. Moreno said the fuel subsidies, in place
for four decades, had distorted the economy and cost $60bn. Diesel
prices have risen from $1.03 to $2.30 per gallon, while gasoline went
from $1.85 to $2.39. Ecuador hopes to save about $1.5bn a year from
ending fuel subsidies.
"The
student, workers and indigenous movement will not stop," the
Confederation of Indigineous communities
wrote on Twitter. "We will continue, indefinitely, until we
end with these neoliberal measures."
Mesias Tatamuez,
head of the Workers' United Front umbrella union, called for a
national strike on Wednesday.
"The
Ecuadorean people are indignant at this package, which is a prize for
businessmen and bankers, to comply with the IMF's recipe," he
said.
Moreno's
popularity has sunk to below 30 percent compared with above 70
percent after his 2017 election.
No comments:
Post a Comment