The professional sportspersons who won awards at Olympic competitions will get twice larger stipends, as a bill that was given a final reading by the MPs provides, IPN reports.

The stipends that now vary between 3,000 to 25,000 lei, depending on the resuts achieved by the athletes, will be this way doubled from 6,000 lei to 50,000 lei.

The bill also specifies the social protection and financial support measures applying to professional athletes. This aspect is now regulated only partially, by a Government decision.

A sum of up to 15 million lei is to be allocated for increasing the stipends by relocating the budget funds planned for sports events, which haven’t been used so far.

Currently, 114 athletes in Moldova get such stipends and only ten of them receive a monthly allowance of over 10,000 lei.

“This is a first step towards supporting our professional athletes who make our country famous all over the world. This bill represents reward for the unimaginable effort they make for our country even if not much has been done for them during 30 years,” said one of the sponsors of the bill, PAS MP Adrian Băluțel.