TIRANA, March 16 – The People’s Advocate has expressed his concern over the sharp rise in Albanian asylum seekers to EU countries, rising poverty levels and the failure of Albania’s social protection system.
“To this day, many citizens to whom Albania does not guarantee a clear living and welfare perspective, people with disabilities, Romas and Egyptians, LGBT people, violated women, jobless people have come up with leaving Albania as the only way,” says Ombudsman Igli Totozani in his 2015 annual report.
“We call on citizens not to abandon the country and appeal to state institutions to take measures for their welcoming and reintegration in the country,” says the Omudsman.
His appeal comes after Albania was among the top countries of origin for asylum seekers in 2015 when over 65,000 Albanians applied for asylum in EU country, the overwhelming majority of whom in Germany.
The Ombudsman says the country’s social protection system is failing to assist the poor.
“Even though there is too much talk of a social state protecting and respecting the poor and the most vulnerable, our social system in fact damages them,” says the People’s Advocate.
The Ombudsman says the situation is a result of a series of factors, including lack of an official subsistence level, deprivation of social assistance, high unemployment rates, the extremely poor families who can’t afford to pay power and running water bills and lack of social housing.
“To this day, the official subsistence level in Albania remains unknown as a concept closely related to the people’s needs to make a living under current conditions,” says the Ombudsman.
The People’s Advocate says the social assistance system, which currently provides modest monthly amounts to more than 81,000 households or 7.3 percent of total families, unfairly leaves out many households in need through the criteria it sets.
“Even households and individuals receiving social assistance, don’t manage to fulfil their basic living requirements with this payment,” notes the report.
Some 62,000 jobseekers receive modest social assistance of up to 4,633 lek (€34)/month, according to state statistical institute INSTAT.
Unemployment is at high levels and employment opportunities are not offered under a system giving a priority to poor households, says the Ombudsman.
The report notes extremely poor households are being deprived of electricity and running water because they cannot afford to pay accumulated unpaid bills.
Albania’s poverty rate increased by 2 percent or around 29,000 people from 2008 to 2012 during the first years of the global financial crisis, according to the latest INSTAT and World Bank survey.
The fraction of the population whose real per capita monthly consumption is below 4,891 lek (€34.6) increased from 12.4 percent in 2008 to 14.3 percent in 2012. Extremely poor population, defined as those with difficulty meeting basic nutritional needs, increased from 1.2 percent in 2008 to 2.2 percent in 2012.
In the previous years, poverty fell from 25.4 percent in 2002 to 18.5 percent in 2005 and 12.4 percent in 2008.
The Albanian economy is expected to grow by 3.4 percent in 2016, following growth rates of 1 to 3 percent since the onset of the global crisis in 2009 and a pre-crisis decade of 6 percent.
