Colombia's Uribe in cabinet crisis

The Colombian president's political problems have worsened

Several members of the Colombian cabinet have offered their resignations in the wake of an apparent government defeat in a referendum on political and economic changes.

The ministers said they wanted to give President Alvaro Uribe a free hand by resigning.

They include Fernando Londono, who is both interior and justice minister. He said he was responsible for the result of Saturday's referendum and would go if the measures fail to gain approval, as appears likely.

Although the final outcome of the referendum will not be known until counting finishes later this week, provisional results suggest that at least 11 of the 15 government proposals failed to gain enough support.

It seems that most of the measures were strongly backed by those who participated, but to pass, each point needed to be voted on by at least 25% of registered voters.

'Plan B'

The low turnout in the referendum is blamed on confusion caused by the complex questions and fear of violence.

REFERENDUM ISSUES Freezing public workers' salaries State pensions Regional auditing offices Funding education and healthcare Destination of oil revenues Congressional voting Numbers of congressmen Role of congress Government funding of regional projects

Many people also reportedly left some sections of the referendum ballot blank, so rendering the result void.

The BBC's Hector Latorre in Bogota says that in the wake of the apparent failure of the government's political and economic reform plan, President Uribe has prepared an alternative package of measures designed to trim $700m from the government's budget.

These measures have yet to be officially announced, but are said to include tax reforms and sales tax increases.

In a further electoral defeat for the president, voters in the capital, Bogota, chose a former trade union leader, Luis Eduardo Garzon, as the city's first left-wing mayor in local elections on Sunday.

Mr Garzon - an ex-communist who came third in last year's presidential election - beat his government-backed rival, Juan Lozano, by 47% to 40%.

The mayor of Bogota is regarded as a prestigious political post and will give the left-wing opposition a platform from which to criticise Mr Uribe.