Government document warning social unrest in the country

Increased demand for new pension schemes and small budgetary opportunities to cover them could lead the country towards social unrest, the Labour Ministry warns, in a document drafted this month. This claim is supported by the ministry in over 20 social categories as they currently receive pension from the state budget and dozens of new demands for involvement in the pension system.

According to this document, which is called “Regulating and Management Pensions Field and Beneficiations by Social Security”, budgetary opportunities to accommodate all these requirements can lead the country towards social unrest.

The document, aimed at reforming the pension system in Kosovo, was drafted this month and was also warned days ago by Labour and Social Management Minister Skender Recica.

The continuation of this system does not allow pension raising because millions of euros will go to financing new pension schemes. In such a situation, social polarization will be inevitable and this situation can and will be out of control where we will have demonstrations of different groups to benefit new pension schemes and current ones to increase pensions”.

The document says that the current pension system allows the expansion of pension schemes uncontrolledly and is too easy to misuse from policy for electoral purposes by favouring a certain group to gain pension rights.

“In the event the current situation continues, the differences between categories will increase, the number of complaints will continue to increase, the number of new schemes will be added. ”

Moreover, the Labour Ministry document warns that with the implementation of many pension schemes without any actual criteria, the path to new demands for various groups which, based on up to now, feels that they meet the conditions to make financial profit”.

The labour ministry in the document points to the impending danger of the state budget to accommodate all these requirements. According to her, the problem is and will remain in the future financing of all current schemes, but especially the schemes expected to come.

When we consider that today we have over 22 personal schemes, several bills -- such as the law for police, educators, and based on these criteria -- should not be excluded from retirement demands by 9050, sports workers of the 1990s, other workers of the Republic of Kosovo in the 1990s. Thus, in the short and medium term, financial difficulties will appear to pay all these retirement costs”, the document says.

Another problem is the size of laws regulating the pension system. This, according to the Labour Ministry, has led to confusion and confusion even the executive organs where, according to you, it remains a challenge to understand when and who are more than a pension if they meet the conditions.

The main purpose of this document is to address the social security system in Kosovo, respectively, the pension and disability system.

The document suggests re-enhancing the social security system, mainly the first thrust of the system, which is based on employers' contributions and employers' contributions, separating it from zero pillars or schemes financed by the state budget.