Luanda - The Minister of State for Economic Coordination, José de Lima Massano, announced on Tuesday in Luanda the commitment of the Angolan government to ensure that the pension awarded to former combatants and veterans of the homeland is in line with the value of the national minimum wage.
Speaking to the press, at the end of the debate and approval session of the Joint Opinion Report and the Draft Resolution of the Draft Law on the General State Budget (OGE) 2025, the minister said that a management will be made in that budget to ensure that the pension to this fringe of society reaches the level of the national minimum wage.
He stressed that this measure guarantees a better dignity and quality of life for pensioners.
'This is one of the concerns presented by the deputies and we will work to take resources that were initially allocated to other priorities to pass on to the aforementioned pensioners and thus give greater comfort from the point of view of their renumeration', he assured.
On the other hand, he reiterated the commitment to work with the Federation of Former Combatants and Veterans of the Fatherland, in order to see structural issues resolved and achieve the title of public utility.
The proposal of the General State Budget for the 2025 financial year includes an increase from 23,000 kwanzas to 57,000/month the amount of pension to be paid to former combatants.
By the way, the Minister of Finance, Vera Daves de Sousa, recently clarified that a long and deep registration work was carried out that culminated in the identification of pensioners or former combatants who should continue to benefit from the pension and others who do not have eligibility criteria defined by the competent sector.
Providing some clarifications to the deputies of the National Assembly's specialty committees, as part of the debate on the 2025 State Budget, the minister said that, as a result of this work, it was possible to obtain savings of 2.3 billion kwanzas, which will be used to allocate the corresponding pension to each beneficiary.
The draft General State Budget Law (OGE) 2025 will go to the final global vote on the 12th of this month.
The document includes revenues and expenses valued at 34.63 trillion kwanzas and presents, as main lines of strength, a real growth in Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of 4.14 percent, to be driven by growth in the non-oil sector, which is expected to grow 5.1 percent.
This proposal was prepared on the basis of an oil price of US$70/barrel and oil production of one million and 98 thousand barrels of oil per day, predicting lower inflation of around 16.6%, compared to the accumulated inflation rate of 23.4% that is expected by the end of 2024. ASS/QCB/DOJ
