Premier: Gov't Doesn't Want to Take People's Money, but Help Them Earn More

Bratislava, May 2 (TASR) - The government doesn't want to take money from people's accounts or from the second (capitalisation) pension pillar, just the opposite: it wants to help them earn more, Premier Robert Fico (Smer-SD) said during the regular "Question Time" in Parliament on Thursday when answering a question by MP Pavol Goga (Smer-SD). The premier rejected claims that the government is going to take people's money or touch their deposits. "Just the opposite: we want to help those people. If today someone has money deposited in a bank for a 'ridiculous interest', the state has the right to offer such a citizen an opportunity to invest his money, for example, in a government bond that we use in highway construction. And he won't get 1.5 percent, but 3 percent," explained Fico. According to Fico, the government wants to apply a similar principle in case of the second pillar. He criticised the fact that the first pensions that were paid with the use of this pillar are lower than those paid solely by social insurance provider Socialna Poistovna. "Rather than sending this money to a US financial market, pension fund management companies must be offered a possibility to use the money in Slovakia, in financing huge infrastructure projects, under better capitalisation. You always have more security in the Slovak Republic than in American stock markets," stressed the premier. ko/mcs