IMF urges cuts in number of public administration employees to Serbia

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is calling on Serbia to reduce the number of employees in the public administration by five per cent next year, Kori Udovicki, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Public Administration Local Self-Government, has said. ‘The talks with the IMF are ongoing on the cuts in the number of employees in the public sector by five per cent in 2015. We hope that we will address this request mostly with people fulfilling the legal requirements for retirement, but there is fear that 25,000 people will have to be laid off,’ Udovicki said for the Belgrade-based daily Blic, adding that this does not refer to employees in public companies. She said that by the end of the year a greater number of retirements in the public sector are expected as a result of the amendments to the Law on Pension and Disability Insurance. ‘This percentage may increase from the current two or two and a half per cent to 3.9 per cent. If this were the case, we would mostly meet the requirement for the reduction in the number of employees. Unless this happens, it is feared that about 25,000 people will be left jobless. In such case, the government will prepare social and retraining programs,’ she said, according to inserbia.info