Frontline allowance disbursed to 825 additional workers

Finance Minister Ibrahim Ameer announced on Sunday that the COVID-19 frontline allowance has been disbursed to 825 additional workers.

The Maldivian government began disbursing the frontline allowance on July 29. Finance Ministry said at the time that it disbursed MVR 2.9 million in frontline allowance to 220 workers for the March to June period.

In a tweet on Sunday night, Finance Minister Ameer announced that the government has disbursed MVR 10.4 million in frontline allowance to an additional 825 workers for the March to June period.

With the disbursement of the allowance to the additional workers this Sunday, the government has now disbursed MVR 13.4 million in frontline allowance to 1,045 workers.

Ameer said that the Finance Ministry developed a system to log, approve and authorize the logs of workers in order to process the frontline allowance, and expressed confidence in the process.

“Allowance is paid with proper documentation and authorization needed for audits and internal control, promoting accountability and due process,” he said.

He also said that additional frontline workers will be paid the allowance soon.

The decision to pay an additional daily allowance of MVR 200 to MVR 500 for frontline workers was announced by Ameer in early May.

He stated that frontline workers engaged in high risk tasks will be paid a daily allowance of MVR 500, while workers engaged in medium risk tasks will receive MVR 250, and workers engaged in low risk tasks will receive MVR 200.

Political appointees, workers in and above deputy minister level, and workers who already receive an allowance for the frontline work are not eligible for the new allowance.