Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan participated in the event dedicated to the 28th anniversary of the local self-government system of Armenia.
The event was also attended by Deputy Prime Minister Tigran Khachatryan, Yerevan Mayor Tigran Avinyan, representatives of the legislative and executive authorities, local self-government bodies, Head of the Council of Europe Office in Yerevan Maxime Longangué , EU Ambassador Vasilis Maragos.
The Prime Minister delivered a welcome speech, congratulated everyone on the occasion of the Day of Local Self-Government, expressed his satisfaction for the determination that was shown and is being shown to implement reforms in the field of local self-government. “It has already been said that many large-scale community enlargement reforms have taken place in the Republic of Armenia, but I want to emphasize that not all of our questions have been addressed here either. In particular, I think that the question of continuing the enlargement of the communities is still a matter of discussion, which of course will have to go through certain discussions.
But I also want to share with you that as a result of a number of recent working discussions and visits, I have some tension regarding the situation of communities with ethnic minority populations, because due to non-enlargement and the lack of scale of subsidy programs, obviously, we get a gap between unenlarged and enlarged communities. Although we have made some changes in the subsidy system in order to increase the subsidy opportunities of the ethnic minority communities, we also provide support with certain other formulas, but my fear is that we will not only be able to fill this gap with these measures, but the gap is growing rapidly. Those who have been in the communities, this is an obvious circumstance that can be seen at first glance,” said Nikol Pashinyan and added that this is an issue that must be discussed with representatives of national minorities, because this is not only about political criticism, but also about the reality that exists in those communities today.
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The Prime Minister also emphasized the continuity of the reform agenda in the local self-government bodies in a socio-psychological sense. “The citizen should recognize the mechanisms through the implementation of which the changes that he expects take place or do not take place,” said the Prime Minister and emphasized the importance of making the concept of “community” clearer and more comprehensible for the residents of the community, because according to the Prime Minister, in the end, both the concepts of “community” and “state” are tools to improve life as a result of collective effort. “In this context, we often talk about decentralization, by and large, it is about the decentralization of responsibility and power. And in a political sense, we should record that we have made that decision, one of the most important decisions, which is a de facto decision by the way, and that decision is as follows: the first, de jure decision, that local self-government elections are held by proportional electoral system, and secondly, de facto, the elections are not falsified, and citizens not only de jure, but also de facto elect their community leadership, their council of elders,” said Nikol Pashinyan.
The Prime Minister emphasized that it is important that along with power, duties and responsibilities are also decentralized, which applies not only to the council of elders and the community, but also to the resident and the citizen. “I must record that there is a very big gap between the citizen, the state and the community, and this gap is visible in the case of many citizens of Armenia outside the house threshold and inside the threshold, because it is a very discussed question, especially in the case of residential buildings, that the attitude of the person inside the threshold to the environment is different, completely different from that beyond the threshold. This is where this gap occurs, because starting from the entrance, the yard, the citizen, the person no longer has the attitude that he has inside the door, because there our social psychology is formulated under the saying “my house is my fortress”, Nikol Pashinyan said. According to the Prime Minister, in terms of governance in a democratic society, the formula “my house is my fortress” should be at least slightly abandoned or reformulated a little. “We have to change our social psychology to a certain extent, noting that our state is our fortress, and our house is our place of residence, within the threshold of which, of course, we have inviolable rights, but beyond the threshold, we also have certain responsibilities,” said Nikol Pashinyan, adding that any state is also a wider structure of community organization.
In that context, the Prime Minister highlighted the importance of the public’s attitude towards the community and the state and emphasized the importance of changing some traditions at the socio-psychological level. “We simply have to give up many traditions. They are the traditions that were formed in the absence of statehood, because they are traditions that we should not be an independent state, we should not have community government, we should have sub-government, we should have occupation government. Therefore, there are many traditions that follow this logic,” the Head of the Government said.
The Prime Minister emphasized that traditions should be distinguished and a clear emphasis should be placed on those traditions which are state, community-centered and which contribute to the establishment of local self-government and state institutions as a tool for universal well-being.
Summarizing the speech, Nikol Pashinyan once again congratulated on the occasion of the Local Self-Government Day and noted that the local government is one of the areas where successes have been recorded. “Here I have to say special words of appreciation to the Cabinet members, governors and heads of communities, because without this cooperation it would not have been possible. I want to share again my conviction that this success is unequivocally and inextricably linked to democracy, this success is linked with the introduction of that tradition of forming local self-government bodies through elections”.
In the sidelines of the event, the film entitled “The path to establishment of the Local Government System in Armenia” was also shown.
The Office to the Prime Minister of the Republic of Armenia