The National Assembly on Friday passed the Park Geun-hye administration’s extra budget bill, ending days of partisan fighting over the spending plan aimed at lifting consumer spending depressed by the Middle East respiratory syndrome outbreak.

The Assembly voted in favor of the 11.56 trillion won ($9.9 billion) supplementary budget bill, 149 to 23, with 35 lawmakers abstaining. The Assembly also passed nearly 60 bills, including amendments to the Criminal Act abolishing a statute of limitations clause for murder cases.

The budget bill allows the government to provide farmers hit by droughts last month with funds for irrigation and obtaining water supplies. The bill will also allow officials to offer loans to hospitals that suffered a drop in customers after treating suspected MERS patients.

The government will offer subsidies and low-interest loans to small and mid-sized businesses struggling from the depressed consumer spending hit by the MERS outbreak. State-owned banks will also offer emergency funds to struggling export firms.

The budget bill’s passage comes after over two weeks of partisan fighting over the extra spending plan, submitted earlier this month by the Park administration.

Ruling Saenuri Party officials backed passing it as soon as possible, but the main opposition New Politics Alliance for Democracy objected, saying the budget bill included spending plans on regional infrastructure projects trying to appease voters ahead of next year’s general elections.

Saenuri officials accepted the NPAD’s objections, cutting related funds to 1.25 trillion won, from the 1.5 trillion that Park officials had initially suggested.

The Saenuri Party also accepted the NPAD demands to cut parts of the bill trying to plug holes in lower-than-expected tax revenues, cutting related funds from 5.6 trillion to 5.4 trillion.

But persisting disagreements over the corporate tax rate could spark another partisan fight in the coming week, with the main opposition demanding the Park administration to raise the 22 percent corporate tax rate.

By Jeong Hunny (hj257@heraldcorp.com)