KUWAIT CITY — Oil-rich Kuwait yesterday ordered a 120 dinar ($440) monthly pay rise for nationals in the public and private sectors after inflation hit a 15-year high, the finance minister said.
It also decided to raise by 50 dinars ($183) the pay of foreigners employed by the government, Mustafa Al-Shamali said, quoted by the official KUNA news agency.
The pay hike will benefit public sector workers and Kuwaitis working in the private sector, pensioners and those receiving government aid, the minister said after an extraordinary Cabinet meeting.
The increase will be paid from March but will not be added to basic pay, said Shamali, apparently in order not to overburden the state pension agency.
A Cabinet statement called the raise a “cost of living allowance” and a measure to face “the abnormal increase in prices of consumer goods.” MPs were quick to dismiss the increase as “too small” and not enough to meet a steep hike in consumer prices, and vowed to enact a law imposing another raise.
“The pay raise announced by the government is very disappointing and too small. It will do nothing in the face of the excessive rise in prices of consumer goods,” MP Saadoun Hammad told reporters.
“We will pass a law to add at least another 50 dinars ($183),” he said.
“We reject this increase because it is well below expectations. We urge the government to review its decision,” MP Khalaf Al-Enezi said.
The average monthly salary of Kuwaiti employees is more than 1,000 dinars ($3,650), but lower for expatriates. The emirate has a 3.2-million population, one million of whom are Kuwaitis.
MPs have been pressing the government to raise pay after the prices of basic goods soared dramatically in recent months with inflation cruising to a 15-year high of 7.3 percent at the end of September.
Last week as Parliament debated the price rises some MPs claimed that the actual inflation rate was as high as 12 percent. Kuwait, which holds about 10 percent of global oil reserves, is pumping 2.5 million barrels per day and has financial assets worth more than 200 $billion.
