BAKU, Azerbaijan, Apr.20
Trend:
We will provide 90,000 unemployed people with public jobs, said Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev during a meeting held through videoconference with the participation of Minister of Labor and Social Protection of Population Sahil Babayev and Minister of Economy Mikayil Jabbarov, Trend reports.
“In connection with the opening of paid public jobs, based on the experience of previous years, we planned to open 37,000 jobs at the beginning of the year. I must also note that this program has been implemented for three to four years. Some people involved in these jobs at the initial stage subsequently switched to other jobs with higher salaries. Therefore, we planned this program in the range of about 30,000-40,000. However, due to the pandemic and given the inevitable increase in unemployment, I gave an order to bring this figure to 50,000 at the initial stage. But now I believe we should increase it to a higher figure – 90,000 paid public jobs should be created this year. This area also requires very serious control. We have already discussed this issue. The mechanism is more transparent today,” said President Ilham Aliyev.
The head of state pointed out that unfortunately, control here was at a zero level at the initial stage and local executive authorities often abused it and appropriated the funds intended for the poor.
“This is utmost dishonesty. It is because of this and other crimes that three heads of the executive authority have already been arrested and their dirty deeds have been documented and disclosed to the public. They have disgraced themselves and their ancestors, they have caused great damage to their loved ones, to the state. We allocated these funds so that people who can’t find work or have low working capacity get paid at least the minimum wage, bring home a little money. We raised the minimum wage to 250 manats, but they appropriated it, kept people’s cards, withdrew money from them and enriched themselves. This is a crime and moral ugliness. You cannot call this otherwise,” said President Ilham Aliyev.
The head of state noted that therefore, all relevant authorities should henceforth pay very serious attention to this issue.
“I am asking citizens too well: if someone’s name is recorded but they don’t receive a salary, let them inform us. Thus, we will provide 90,000 unemployed people with public jobs. As for the self-employment program, we talked about this issue last time, and I think that attracting 12,000 people to this program this year is a very good indicator. On our initiative, the World Bank also joined this program. At the same time, Azerbaijani banks joined it for the first time. I do hope that Azerbaijani banks will help more people from this category next year. I also asked you to increase the number of people receiving targeted social assistance,” said President Ilham Aliyev.