Izet Dushi, 80 years old, lives in Sweden, but receives a contributory pension from the Kosovo state budget.
Even Arifja, 75 years old, who has been living in Germany for 21 years, also benefits from an old-age pension from Kosovo.
Civil society representatives consider that this practice should be stopped because it is illegal and damages the state budget by over 51 million euros per year.
Meanwhile, the former Minister of Labor and Social Welfare, Skënder Reçica, says that all citizens of Kosovo over the age of 65, regardless of where they live, can receive a pension based on the law if they meet the legal criteria.
According to the results of the population census, published on December 19 by the Statistics Agency of Kosovo (ASK), 173,875 citizens over the age of 65 live in Kosovo.
However, 202,500 is the number of people, according to this agency, who received pensions in November of this year from the state budget. Age pensioners who receive 120 euros per month are 154,167 and 48,333 people are contributory pensioners who receive from 218 to 318 euros, depending on the level of education.
From the comparison of the population census data and those of KAS, it results that 28,625 beneficiaries are more than there are resident residents of this age, Selatin Kllokoqi from the non-governmental organization Demokracia Plus tells Radio Free Europe.
"If we calculate an average of 150 euros per month, taking into account the value of the basic pension and the value of the contributory pension, it turns out that these people illegally benefit per month over 4.2 million euros or for a year over 51 million euros", says Kllokoqi , adding that the law clearly provides that the beneficiaries of any of these pensions must be resident residents or stay six months out of the year in Kosovo.
So, these are not residents, but live outside of Kosovo, such as in Serbia, Germany, Switzerland, Sweden and other countries of Europe and the world.
"So these are violating the law because the same citizen cannot be a permanent resident, resident, in two states", emphasizes Kllokoqi.
But some beneficiaries, like Izet Dushi, defend their right.
Dushi is about 80 years old, from the city of Vushtrri, but has been living in Sweden for 32 years.
Dushi emphasizes that with more than 20 years of work in education in the municipality of Vushtrri, he benefits from a pension of 220 euros per month, which he says is due to him by law.
Also, he considers the obligation to appear every six months for verification to be inconvenient and tiresome.
"I'm spending the money I'm getting on travel tickets to Kosovo every six months, to show up at the retirement office," he says to Radio Free Europe.
To complete the verification, 74-year-old Arifja from Pristina will also come from Germany in February next year.
He says he has never worked in the German state.
She receives 120 euros per month as an old-age pension from the Kosovo state budget, and for about nine years, every February and August, she appears before the responsible institutions for verification.
"Sometimes I regret taking this money because the value is small and I feel sorry for the pensioners in Kosovo. There I receive social assistance, the value of which is several times greater. But, believe me, I didn't even spend a month myself, I left it to my son because he doesn't have a big salary and uses it for children's courses", she says.
Recipients of pensions are obliged to report every six months to the nearest offices of the Department of Pensions, which operate within the Ministry of Finance, Labor and Transfers (MFPT).
This ministry did not respond to REL's interest regarding the question of the number of beneficiaries of these pension schemes who live abroad.
But, in short, they said that "each pensioner has the condition to be a resident in Kosovo, for at least 183 days [six months] within the year and to be notified every six months for verification".
This issue has been resurfaced following the release of census data, highlighting the need for stricter oversight and fair enforcement of the law.
Kllokoqi says that the more precise implementation of the law, such as field inspections, enables the identification of persons who are not permanent residents of Kosovo and benefit illegally from pension schemes.
"The cooperation agreements between the MFPT, the Border Police and the International Airport of Pristina would help identify persons who come to Kosovo only to be notified once every six months", he emphasizes.
Skënder Asllani, former director of the Department of Pensions in the Ministry of Finance, agrees with this, even though he considers it a difficult and troublesome process.
"This is a problem because we have [North] Macedonia, Albania, where identity cards are used. Sometimes they are recorded, and sometimes they are not. Second, we have the Serbian community, they have documents that they live in Kosovo, they have properties, they have addresses, but they live in Serbia and they come and are notified every six months. It is not easy to cope with this job", he says.
Asllani remembers that several times they thought of finding a solution to this issue, but it was impossible to materialize.
"It is impossible to find a solution quickly because the administrative instruction allows them to come and be notified twice a year", he emphasizes.
The other possibility, according to Kllokoq, is the organization of an awareness campaign to inform the persons who act in an illegal manner.
"Banning funds for people living outside Kosovo would create conditions for increasing pensions for those living in Kosovo", he declares.
But the former Minister of Labor and Social Welfare, Skënder Reçica, has a different opinion.
He says that pensioners should not be blamed for breaking the law, as the institutions of Kosovo themselves have created this possibility.
"They fulfill the legal criteria: they come and are notified twice a year," he says.
The only solution, according to Recice, is for the Government of Kosovo to reach bilateral agreements on social security with other countries, especially with those where the Kosovo diaspora is concentrated.
"When we talk about state-to-state agreements, if a citizen of Kosovo has turned 65 and lives in the region or in the states of the European Union, he can receive social assistance there as well. However, when there is a bilateral agreement, the pension received in Kosovo is deducted from the benefit received in the other country, such as Switzerland. In this way, the citizen receives a part from Kosovo and a part from another state, but cannot accept two full pensions", he says.
MFPT did not answer what measures it will take to identify these persons, but the ministry said that "Kosovo already has such agreements with Switzerland, Belgium, Albania and the Netherlands".
In the middle of December, a new agreement was also initiated with Slovenia, while the Government is in the process of negotiating similar agreements with Austria, Turkey, North Macedonia and Montenegro, said the ministry.
However, until now, the MFPT said that "only 26 citizens living in Switzerland and Belgium benefit from contributory pensions based on these agreements".
In addition to pensioners who benefit from pensions from the state budget, the Government of Kosovo since 2021 has started to allocate monthly allowances to children with Kosovar citizenship between the ages of 0 and 16.
Even in this category, the results of the KAS registration have shown a greater number of payments than the number of children resident in Kosovo.
According to these data, over 372,000 children of these ages live in Kosovo, while in July of this year, the Ministry of Finance told Radio Free Europe that the number of beneficiaries has reached over 404,000 children.
Regarding this, the Minister of Finance, Hekuran Murati, during a media conference on December 27, said that he does not know the exact number of children who do not live in Kosovo and are beneficiaries of allowances. However, he added that there were several cases when the children's families were identified as not being residents of Kosovo and their allowances were stopped.
Children benefit from 20 euros per month, while those from families with three or more children receive 30 euros per month.
In addition to pensions and regular monthly allowances, the Government of Kosovo allocated an amount of 100 euros for these categories on the occasion of the New Year holiday. /REL/ (A2 Televizion)
