Ministry of Social Affairs collects 28 million dinars debts
Dr. Khaled Al-Ajmi, Acting Undersecretary of the Ministry of Social Affairs, revealed that the percentage of collection of accumulated aid debts that were spent unjustly reached nearly 50 percent, amounting to 28 million dinars out of the total debt of 58 million.
He further stressed that the collection rates are constantly increasing, especially since all cases that received these funds were inquired about their employers, and official letters were sent to them to deduct them, especially since they are public funds and will not be dropped.
In addition, Al-Ajmi told Al-Jarida that “the Ministry has made great strides in collecting the debt and avoiding the observations and shortcomings mentioned in the annual report issued by the Audit Bureau regarding the audit, inspection and review operations of the ministry’s work, which showed that they had accumulated for several reasons, most notably the death of the aid recipient without the ministry’s knowledge or awareness, due to the failure to complete the automatic link at that time with the relevant authorities, thus the disbursement process continued without stopping.”
He stressed that the automatic link that was made between “Affairs” and the relevant government agencies stopped this illegal disbursement and showed the accumulated debts of these people, “whereby the ministry began taking its legal measures to return these amounts that were disbursed unjustly.”
Complete Automatic Linking
Dr. Khaled Al-Ajmi pointed out that there is a periodic review by the Legal Affairs Department and the committee formed to follow up on the debt balances in the ministry, to prevent their accumulation and take the necessary measures to collect them.
He mentioned that the ministry is striving to collect these debts through friendly means first, either by paying the full amount, or approving a request to pay it in monthly installments.
If the person is a government employee, adding that “if friendly means fail, the ministry resorts to filing lawsuits against those concerned, and demanding that they return these amounts, especially since they are public funds that have their sanctity.”
Al-Ajmi further stated that the ministry is currently working on completing the automated link with the remaining government agencies, after it succeeded in linking with most of them, noting that it has communicated with the undersecretaries of the ministries of those agencies to accelerate the link, which we expect to be completed soon, especially since it has reduced the disbursement of undeserved aid, adding that “regarding some of the proposed amendments to the Public Aid Law, they have been submitted to the Fatwa and Legislation Department to study them from the legal aspects, as they will be a priority in the coming period.”
Reasons for Debt Accumulation
In addition, the Ministry of Social Affairs sources attributed the reasons for the accumulation of debts to the delay of some government agencies in completing the automatic link with the ministry, in addition to reducing the value of the monthly deduction for debts by only 10 percent of the original debt (the value of the aid disbursed without right).
This resulted in low collection rates and a long period of time taken for that, noting that the continued discovery of new debts by the concerned committee for aid disbursed in violation of the law and regulations, and adding them to the current debt, stands in the way of increasing the collection rates.
The sources also pointed out that “cases of suspension that have a source of income (employer, salaries of the General Organization for Social Insurance) require a lot of time to address those entities and insurances.
Whereas, cases that do not have a source of income from which deductions can be made require communicating with the beneficiary or his relatives to pay in a friendly manner, and if this is not possible, it takes some time to address the legal authorities in the Ministry and outside it, to take the necessary action.”
