Transnistria and Gagauzia

​RUSSIAN EXTRA-PENSION FOR TRANSNISTRIAN ELDERLY TO BECOME LOWER

08 september, 2015

Transnistrian pensioners have got an unpleasant news from authorities. The Moscow-provided monthly “Putin’s extras” to their pensions will become smaller starting from September, due to the Russian ruble depreciation, announced unrecognized Transnistrian Moldovan republic (PMR) finance minister Elena Ghirjul.

According to local media, she said that the extra payment in itself remained the same. The Russian assistance arrives at PMR responsible bodies’ accounts once in half-year in Russian rubles. At converting to Transnistrian rubles it turned out that the sum is all the time different. This is due to the volatility of the Russian ruble exchange rate, which demonstrates the decline trend against the US dollar. Since September 2014 the Russian ruble depreciated 45%, while the Transnistrian remained unchanged. Consequently, the Russian currency also lowered its cost by almost one-half against the Transnistrian ruble.

“Currently, due to the Russian ruble depreciation, we are taking into account the number of beneficiaries at converting the money. For example, currently we distributed the sum at the four remaining months: September, October, November and December – and we are basing oneself on the money we have according to the exchange rate from the day of conversion”, the Minister said.

She promised that as soon as the Russian ruble starts going up, the sum of extra payments will also go up.

As Infotag has already reported, each 6 months Russia is transferring to the PMR approximately 525 million rubles for paying additional pension to the elderly. People call it “Putin’s pension”, as the decision was taken back in 2008, when Vladimir Putin was Prime Minister.

However, earlier this pension accounted in terms of local currency around 150 Transnistrian rubles (US$13.5) per month. At the beginning of 2015, due to the Russian ruble depreciation the sum of payments went down to 100 rubles (US$9), while now, after a new revision, it will become even smaller. And this is in conditions, when due to lack of funds the PMR authorities are paying to pensioners only 70% of the accrued payments, promising to repay the rest of money when funds accumulate in the budget.

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