Even though the disclosures of the National Security Service are linked to hundreds of millions of dollars abuses and fraud, they are not that impressive for the majority. People are waiting to see ex-ministers, MPs, oligarchs, and others behind bars. But we must understand that it is not an “ordered concert”: to arrest so that those masses can slake their “thirst for justice”. A “pleasing” step has already been taken: law-breaking drivers’ fines have been ignored. Law-abiding drivers understood what a “mistake” they had made by following the rules of the traffic, perhaps many regretted their “mistake”, and will drive just like the law-breaking drivers who have hundreds of thousands of fines. Especially that soon there will be no speedometers and cameras in town, and everything will be “settled” by offering 5 or 10 thousand drams to the inspector.
Steps to please the aggressive law-breaking “lumpen”, I think, are enough, and now it is the right time to do just the opposite, not popular but necessary steps. Why right now? Because at this point the government has the support of the vast majority of citizens of Armenia: in a visible historical future, such opportunity may no longer arise. Moreover, after a year this government will not have the same degree of confidence that it has today: enthusiasm, revolutionary euphoria cannot last forever, the social situation will not change significantly, external threats will remain, internal contradictions may arise within the “winning team”, etc. This is a historical phenomenon and does not depend on the merits of government members.
Such a non-popular step that the current government can make is to introduce a mandatory funded pension system. If we really want our today’s young people to receive a normal pension in 20-25 years, if we need “long-term money” in our financial system, then we have to take that step right now. When the debate on this topic was going on in 2013-14, the government team was split: particularly Tigran Sargsyan and Hovik Abrahamyan were fighting against each other. Plus, of course, populist arguments, for instance, “we do not trust this government, they will pocket our money”. Now we trust the current government, do not we? What hinders then?
Postponing for a year does not solve a problem. In a year, this system will be much more difficult to introduce than now. I already explained why.
Aram ABRAHAMYAN
