Direct Request (CEACR) - adopted 2011, published 101st ILC session (2012)

Equality of Treatment (Accident Compensation) Convention, 1925 (No. 19) - Bolivia (Plurinational State of) (Ratification: 1954)

Article 1 of the Convention (in conjunction with Article 2). Equality of treatment in relation to employment accidents. Application in practice. With reference to its previous comments, the Committee notes the adoption, in the context of the implementation of Act No. 1732 of 29 November 1996 on pensions, of Supreme Decree No. 25902 of 15 September 2000 determining the conditions for coverage by long-term compulsory social insurance (SSO) in the case of foreign nationals employed in the Plurinational State of Bolivia. Under the terms of section 6 of the Decree, foreign nationals employed in the country in a dependent employment relationship who conserve in their country of origin coverage similar to that guaranteed in the context of the SSO may not be subject to the requirement to register with the SSO provided that they make an application to that effect to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Worship, accompanied by the necessary documents to justify the approval of their application. The Committee requests the Government to indicate whether the possibility envisaged in section 6 of Decree No. 25902 applies to temporary and intermittent workers, in accordance with Article 2 of the Convention. The Committee also requests the Government to specify whether this arrangement makes it possible to ensure that a foreign national who is the victim of an employment accident in the Plurinational State of Bolivia, and who has maintained employment accident coverage in her or his country of origin, receives all of the necessary medical care under the same conditions as Bolivian nationals and within the medically required time limits.

Article 1(2). Payment of benefits abroad. The Committee notes that, under the terms of section 7 of Decree No. 25902, when foreign workers covered by the SSO leave the Plurinational State of Bolivia definitively, including following an employment accident, they are authorized to request the transfer of their acquired rights to their country of residence when a bilateral agreement has been concluded to this effect in the context of the principle of international reciprocity. The Committee notes that the Convention establishes an automatic reciprocity system between States that have ratified the Convention with a view to avoiding the conclusion of multiple bilateral agreements between the States as parties. The Committee requests the Government to indicate how it organizes the payment of invalidity and survivors’ pensions in the event of the residence abroad of the beneficiaries, whether they are of Bolivian nationality or nationals of a State that has ratified the Convention.