When I am talking to a high-ranking official about corruption, he somewhat puzzled is asking, “Do you think I am taking bribes?” I sincerely believe that officials of this level do not take bribes. Some of them, true, collect the bribes collected by their subordinates. For example, the customs officers take bribes from all “unsheltered” people. Without passing it “above” they will not be able to do it. Therefore, we need to change the tax laws so that it would not be possible to interpret them with dual meaning. On the other hand, the citizens and companies importing goods need to be educated so that they know their rights by heart.
But to say that “collecting taxes” is the primary source of corruption, of course, would be a gross exaggeration. As of today, “corruption risks” are centralized in two locations: creating privileged conditions for the businesses of officials and the “associated persons thereof”, and various international programs, including the loans. If an official (or an oligarch who is the same “appointed” official) and the “unsheltered person” do not have the sale opportunities of producing, exporting and importing, it is already a corruption. And most interestingly that the top officials do not even realize it; it seems to them that they only “have businesses”, and God has gifted such a business-doing talent to them or their friends that this business is prospering. When the government or the National Assembly make a decision in favor of these businesses, it is also corruption.
Major international projects as much as corruption, from which first of all the international functionaries sitting in Armenia have a “kickback” and secondly, there is an opportunity here to write off the money and deplete it, thirdly, real and unreal personnel with fantastic wages opened in various PIUs and SNCOs opened in the framework of these international programs are inexhaustible source of depleting money. Why the wages of a PIU employee should be higher than the minister’s is not so clear. If you want a good specialist and a decent person work as a minister, you should pay high wages to him. An officially high salary rather than an “envelope” that makes him dependent of corruptions.
The ground of corruption is the lack of transparency. Suppose, an oligarch is forced to give one million dollars to the army. If he does it in secret, then he will demand something for his “patriotism.” And also, it is not yet clear whether this million goes to the “jeeps” of the generals or onto the weapons.
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… “Reducing” the number of “Gas-31” vehicles has nothing to do with the fight against corruption.
Aram ABRAHAMYAN
