The Control Chamber has settled down the “Regulatory guillotine” program. This national legislative regulatory center that deals with the reforms of the laws “cut-off and throws out” the unnecessary normative acts that impede the businesses, cause a bureaucratic fuss for the citizens and limit the possibilities of wasting the budget money, has violated the law itself trying to waste millions of funds. This year, the Control Chamber (CC) had carried out research at the National Center for legislative regulations, inspecting the use of grants provided to Armenia by the foreign states and international organizations, as well as the use of the state budget funds.
All financial operations of the Center made since 1 January 2012 to 1 April 2015 were inspected. What the Control Chamber detected is neither mockery nor a waste of money. Basically, this agency has evaded the “guillotine” of the Center. Here, millions of finances were not registered, no invoices were issued, and who knows if the CC has not entered the Center, what would be the fate of these millions, whose pockets they will fill, more precisely, whether this money already filled in the pockets would come out or not. Director of the Center, Armen Yeghiazaryan, all the property that he had received in 2012 for the Center: computers, hard and soft furniture, air conditioners, telephones, blinds and even the safe, was not registered on the balance of the Center. When the CC was conducting inspections at the Center, it was detected that the computer equipment worth of 923.9 thousand drams was missing from the Center, unfortunately, the report of the Control Chamber does not mention the location of them, it only states, “the computer equipment worth of 923.9 thousand drams was restored physically during the inspection.”
The CC detected that under the loan agreement signed between the “International Bank for Reconstruction and Development” and the Republic of Armenia, the equipment and property obtained by the 2nd project of modernization of the public sector, a total of 42 million 822 thousand drams (31,922.5 + 10,900.0), were attached to the Center. To the point, the Center accepted the equipment worth of 31 million 922 thousand drams (25 nominal computer equipment, air conditioners, etc.) by the submission act from the “Fine” stores in 2012, but the property is not registered by the Center and was not entered into the balance, although was used for years.
For example, according to the Control Chamber, 25 nominal device-equipment (computer equipment, air conditioners, telephones, etc.), were not registered in the balance sheet of the Center, a total of 31 million 922 thousand drams, 19 nominal hard and soft property (furniture, blinds, safe and so on) worth of 10 million 900 thousand drams. In other words, the Center has operated the property worth of a few dozen million dram for years, but it was not registered by any document while the Center was obligated to do these functions within one month as prescribed by the respective law and defined by the government decree. In fact, this agency dealing with legislative regulations either has ignored the RA law and the government decree, or who knows what he had in mind.
Reporting the violations, the Control Chamber has recommended the National Center for Legislative Regulation to eliminate the violations, take measures as soon as possible to register the equipment and property acquired under the loan agreement, to plan the maintenance costs of the RA State budget-funded agency based on fundamental calculations, taking into account the actual performance of the last year, and inform the Control Chamber about the measures taken. In last June, the Director of the Center, Armen Yeghiazaryan, in an interview with the journalists, had told that the “Regulatory guillotine” is the review of the entire legislation for simplifying and facilitating it for the businesses and individuals. Yeghiazaryan had said that the regulations will cut down about 50% of the costs, the goal of the program is to make the contact of the population and the businesses easier and to spend less time and money.
Still in last June, the Center had already reviewed 9 areas, including healthcare, tax and customs services. “If all our recommendations are accepted, we can do roughly 25 billion drams worth of savings. Approximately 20 areas are left, which we will manage to finish by next June. After examining these areas, by our estimates, we can do approximately 60 billion drams worth of savings.” Noteworthy, over these years, only about 785 thousand euro grant was allocated to this Center, the agency was also funded from the state budget, and after the works conducted over these years, the business and the people’s life was not facilitated in terms of communicating with state agencies. Thousands of citizens still complain about the bureaucratic red tape, both the tax authorities, healthcare, cadaster and other spheres.
Nelly BABAYAN,
“Aravot” daily
