BOGOTÁ (AP) — Colombian President Gustavo Petro decided to make three cabinet changes on Monday as he tries to push through ambitious social reforms. Among those leaving is Minister Alejandro Gaviria, one of the staunchest critics of the health reform Congress is about to debate.
The president thanked Gaviria, who led the education portfolio, for the services rendered during six months of management, María Isabel Urrutia, as Minister of Sports, and Patricia Ariza, in the Ministry of Culture.
“With their contributions, they have helped enrich the debate and initiate the changes the country voted for,” Petro said in a presidential address accompanied by the rest of his cabinet. He added, “I invite you to join us from wherever you are. Help build this social pact.”
This is Petro’s first change of minister since he took power in August 2022 as the first leftist president in Colombia’s history.
Before announcing the changes in the ministries, the president defended the reforms of health, work and the pension system and assured that his government “is not going to give up” on improving health and providing “working conditions fair” to all Colombians.
Gaviria, although he led the education portfolio, has gained particular prominence in recent weeks due to his criticism of health reform, an area in which he has been an expert since leading this ministry from 2012 to 2018.
The government intends to profoundly modify the health system in force in Colombia for 29 years to make it a system with less private intermediation and in which the State has more control over the resources available and the provision of the service.
The health reform is the only one that is perfectly known and that has been tabled in Congress. In addition to the objections of his opponents, over the weekend a letter leaked to the press in which the outgoing education minister, the head of the ministry of agriculture and the treasury criticized the reform.
On Monday, Petro confirmed the authenticity of the letter and assured that it had served as input for the construction of the project and had been widely discussed within the government.
The letter warned, among other things, that the reform “would have an impact on the finances of the Nation”. However, Monday, the Minister of Finance explained in a press release that within the government work is being done so that the cost of the reform is adjusted to “commitments with budgetary consolidation, adjustment of external accounts and macroeconomic stability”.