Sources: Pensions increase imminent

The labour ministry’s working group in charge of the retirement pensions finished its proceedings and presented its first recommendations to the Social Security and Labour Ministry. The Ministry will escalate the matter to the prime minister concerning the so waited pensions increase. According to our sources, the recommendations included 20% to 30% increase for the retired wages.According to the same sources Prime Minister Ahmed Ouyahia urged the Labour Ministry to work on the file very quickly and make proposals as to the subject before the end of the month in order to get it signed-off at the upcoming Council of Ministers’ meeting.The emergency aspect of the work done so far is due to the recommendations raised by the latest tri-partite (Government-trade unions and private companies’ owners) . The response had to be immediate as well after the retired people’s union menaced the government of street protests1 million 600 thousand retired people are waiting for the upcoming Council of Ministers to announce the increase they are waiting for. The increase will also be the last episode of a series of salaries increase that took place on the public sector labour market during the last 24 months.