In a short message, former President Guillermo Lasso spoke out against the statements of President Daniel Noboa and his Minister of Finance Juan Carlos Vega, who assured that they received a country with a serious economic situation.

On the afternoon of Monday, November 27, Noboa said that “Ecuador is in the worst moment”, which is why he asked the population for support for the draft Employment Law that he will present.

While Vega presented figures on the delicate state of the country, among which they point out that the fiscal fund has barely 184 million dollars in the Single Treasury Account, debts to various public and private sector institutions total 2,872 million dollars, the fiscal deficit will close to more than 5,000 million dollars, and the public debt amounts to 63,000 million dollars.

In this regard, Guillermo Lasso shared a message in a chat with the media in which he stated: “Official numbers and data do not lie.”

He accompanied his brief words with an image containing twelve fiscal indicators since he took power, in May 2021, and the end of his government, in November 2023. The information comes from sources such as the Central Bank of Ecuador (BCE), the Ministry of Economy and Finance and State Institute for Statistics and Censuses (INEC).

According to this data, the treasury account recorded $65 million on May 23, 2021, and by November 21, 2023, it was $166 million.

Payments to the Ecuadorian Social Security Institute (IESS) totaled $989 million (between 2017-2019) and rose to $4,757 million during the Lasso period, according to figures shared by the former president.

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Accounts payable increased from $3.635 million to $2.885 million. This last number coincides with what the minister of finance in the government of Daniela Noboa said.

One of the numbers that doesn’t match what Juan Carlos Vega and former president Guillermo Lasso said is the level of the fiscal deficit. The minister said that this year it will amount to 5% of GDP; while the former ruler indicated that it is projected to be 3% of GDP.

Pablo Arosemena, the former finance minister in Guillermo Lasso’s government, has yet to publicly comment on what Noboa and Vega said.

Tax information shared by former president Guillermo Lasso. Photo: Courtesy.

After the current head of finance gave a summary of the economic situation in the country, President Daniel Noboa announced that the first action of his government to overcome the economic crisis will be the presentation of the Emergency Economic Law to create jobs, for which the head of state asked for the support of civil society and private companies .