BOGOTA (Reuters) – Economic committees from both houses of Colombia’s Congress threw out the government’s proposed 2025 budget on Wednesday, rejecting the bill’s proposed value and arguing the Andean country will not be able to raise the proposed sum amid lower-than-projected tax collection.
At the end of July, Colombia’s finance ministry presented a proposed budget to Congress for next year worth 523 trillion pesos ($122 billion).
The budget was rejected even after the finance ministry on Tuesday presented a new fiscal reform proposal to lawmakers to raise some additional 12 trillion pesos ($2.8 billion), which the government says would finance the budget.
But the majority of lawmakers sitting on economic commissions in both the Senate and the lower house said government efforts to raise more funds, including plans to tackle evasion and avoidance, are not realistic.
Colombian President Gustavo Petro on Tuesday said he would set the budget by decree if Congress rejected it.
($1 = 4,285.61 Colombian pesos)
(Reporting by Nelson Bocanegra and Carlos Vargas; Writing by Oliver Griffin and Julia Symmes Cobb)
