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Disability pensions: an audit revealed that there were fake certificates, deaths and people living abroad - Infobae
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Pensiones por invalidez laboral: una auditoria reveló que había certificados truchos, fallecidos y personas viviendo en el exterior
La investigación interna llevada adelante por la ANDIS revela un “escandaloso negocio con la discapacidad” que “representaría un desvío de fondos estimados entre 1.200 y 2.000 millones de dólares al año”. En la Ciudad de Buenos Aires más del 50% de los beneficiarios contaban con documentación falsa
www.infobae.com
September 20, 2024
The internal investigation carried out by ANDIS reveals a “scandalous business with disabilities” that “would represent a diversion of funds estimated between 1.2 and 2 billion dollars a year.” In the City of Buenos Aires, more than 50% of the beneficiaries had false documentation.
By Andres Klipphan
ANDIS discovered an alleged corrupt circuit in the system for granting non-contributory pensions. Even a dog's X-ray was presented as a diagnosis.
The Government of La Libertad Avanza continues with audits on more than 1,250,000 people who benefit from non-contributory pensions for work-related disability. The first districts to be audited are the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires and the province of Buenos Aires , in this case, it began with the seaside city of Mar del Plata . The results to which this media had access reveal, according to the words of Diego Spagnuolo , director of the National Agency for Disability (ANDIS) , "a corruption scheme" through which there would be a diversion of funds estimated between 1.2 and 2 billion dollars a year.
According to the documentation accessed by Infobae , national authorities began a series of audits in August. This first stage covers almost 29,000 pensioners living in CABA and more than 300,000 in the province of Buenos Aires . The provinces of Chaco, Jujuy and Salta , which account for around 175,000 pensions, will be the next to be investigated.
“Disturbing results”
According to the description made by ANDIS officials , “the results of the first stage of the audit carried out in the City of Buenos Aires are disturbing.” Of the 10,000 beneficiaries contacted, 33% “could not be located at the addresses indicated,” a fact that, according to the forms, “raises serious doubts about the veracity of their statements.” The lack of contact with many of these beneficiaries of non-contributory pensions for work-related disability will force the national authorities to “make a second summons through various means, including certified letters and emails.”
Diego Spagnuolo, director of ANDIS, ordered an audit of the more than 1,250,000 non-contributory pensions for work-related disability (Source)
The review of the files and the check-up of each personal case carried out with medical experts showed that “many of them have incompatibilities that could invalidate their right to receive these pensions.” Of the pensioners audited so far, 57% “do not meet the established requirements.” That is, of the 9,336 beneficiaries randomly selected to be audited, only 1,063, barely 17%, had a “positive result.” For example, the medical certificate through which the process to obtain the benefit had been initiated was compatible with their illness, among other aspects.
Meanwhile, in the first round of audits in the province of Buenos Aires, 900 pensioners living in the city of Mar del Plata were summoned . Of these, 180, that is 21%, could not be located. Of the 720 notified, only 462 attended, and of these, only 20% met all the requirements demanded by the regulations. The remaining 80% do not meet the requirements such as having a disability, or not having a job. Of this total, 13% “lack the necessary documentation.”
There are cases that, for the authorities of ANDIS, “are the most alarming” and, according to Spagnuolo, are part of the “disability business.”
Among them are:
- A man had four different health diagnoses and was accompanied by a lawyer when he was summoned to be examined by the medical auditor .
- There were beneficiaries - the number is not specified - who had incomplete documentation or whose clinical diagnosis was false and claimed that they received the non-contributory pension because " they were supported by representatives of the Evita Movement ." Some of them were also accompanied by a lawyer.
- In another case, instead of the beneficiary, his son came to the audit. When asked about the beneficiary, he admitted that his father “has been living in Egypt for months” and that he receives the pension.
- A woman who tried to impersonate her deceased husband, whose death was not registered in the State systems. She tried to convince auditors that a “mistake” had caused the names to be mixed up.
- Two beneficiaries were serving sentences before receiving the benefit. One of them attended the audit despite being “under house arrest ” and without having notified the judicial authorities. In the second case, a relative showed up because he was serving a sentence in a prison. Both received the benefit in an express manner in 13 days. It was granted a few days before December 10, 2023.
It refers to the complaint made by the prosecutor Guillermo Marijuan and instructed by his colleague Gerardo Pollicita . According to official data, between 2003 and 2015, that is, the governments of Néstor Kirchner and Cristina Fernández de Kirchner , the number of non-contributory pensions for occupational disability went from 80,000 to 1,050,000, "an unprecedented number even in countries that have suffered world wars," they say from ANDIS . During the government of Mauricio Macri , the figure remained constant, but during the presidency of Alberto Fernández , the number of beneficiaries rose again to 1,250,000 pensions as of December 10, 2023, among the people who accessed that pension were prisoners who did not have any disability.
"The pensions were bargaining chips approved in reduced periods of three months that would be given to people who did not have the condition of occupational disability," said prosecutor Guillermo Marijuan. Photo NA: MARIANO SANCHEZ
On this subject, the prosecutor Marijuan, stated in his complaint: “Such increase would have been a consequence of a process of articulation of decrees and resolutions by means of which the criteria originally established for the granting of such pensions would have been made more flexible, and by the implementation of a circuit for processing such benefits especially aimed at political issues of favors with governors and mayors, in which the pensions were bargaining chip approved in reduced times of three months that would be given to people who not only did not have the condition of occupational disability, but in many cases did not even have a medical condition of disability, which would have functioned in parallel to the formal circuit in which the processing for the granting of such benefit took between 2 and 3 years.”
A senior government official told this newspaper: “All this, in addition to being yet another scam by the caste, seriously violates the rights of people with disabilities and is unfair to good citizens who pay their taxes thinking that they are destined to help those in need and in reality they are used for political dealings and the benefit of a few, breaking equality before the law.”
For Spagnuolo, “this scandal highlights the urgent need for a thorough review of the disability pension system , with the aim of ensuring that only those who really need it can access these benefits.” The president’s lawyer, Javier Milei, recalled that his management of the ANDIS “advances in pursuit of transparency and justice in a system that, until now, has been marked by abuse” and assured that “the benefit will not be taken away from those who truly deserve it,” but that it will be lost by “those people who were granted it fraudulently during the last administrations.”
