Pensioners call on Gil Party leaders to exploit coalition talks for their benefit

"This is their final chance to do what they promised to do in the beginning; if not, they will be wiped from the map."

By RUTH EGLASH
old people 88 (photo credit: )
old people 88
(photo credit: )
As Kadima leader Tzipi Livni continues her negotiations with political parties to form a government, nonprofit groups that work with the elderly want the Gil Pensioner's Party to use its muscle to further the status of retirees. "Why is the party not taking advantage of its status to improve the economic situation of the country's elderly?" asked Natan Levon, chairman of Ken Lazaken (Yes to the Elderly), an organization that advances elderly rights. "This is their final chance to do what they promised to do in the beginning; if not, they will be wiped from the map." Supporters of Ken Lazaken and others promoting pensioner's rights plan to demonstrate Wednesday at noon outside the residence of Gil Pensioner's Party leader Rafi Eitan, in a final attempt to urge the party, the sixth-largest in the Knesset, to leverage its power to help its constituency. In the National Insurance Institute's most recent poverty report published last February, data showed that 23.5 percent of the country's elderly live below the poverty line. That figure was an increase from the previous year, where it stood at 22.9%. "Apart from several small projects, the Pensioner's Party has not pursued any of the basic issues that need to be addressed, such as guaranteeing a significant rise in old age pensions," explained Levon. "There have been some increases here and there but nothing that will make any real difference." The party, which won seven mandates in the last general election, has been dogged by disagreements in recent months. Last April, the party split, with three of the MKs - Elhanan Glazer, Sara Marom Shalev, Moshe Sharoni - forming the Justice for the Old faction. Last week, however, the two parties announced they were reuniting ahead of coalition talks. A spokesman for the party told The Jerusalem Post Sunday that when Eitan begins talks with Livni he is "ready to stand his ground regarding improving the conditions for the elderly. "We don't care about getting the right portfolio in the government; we only care about the pensioners in this country," the spokesman said, adding that state pensions and other benefits for the elderly were most certainly on the party's agenda. "These claims by Ken Lazaken are unpleasant and unfounded," he added. "We are the first party to ever be solely focused on helping the elderly."