Azat Artsakh – Republic of Nagorno Karabakh (NKR)
April 16 2004

IS THE PRIVATIZATION LAW EFFICIENT?

Member of parliament Edward Aghabekian set forth the legislative
undertaking to make amendments to the NKR law `On privatization of
state property’. According to E. Aghabekian, certain points of the law
contradict to the Civil Code. In particular the notions of state and
personal property in the law prevail over the community property,
whereas the equality of legal forms of ownership and immunity is
maintained in the Code. According to E. Aghabekian, the state body
(the government) should not occupy with the privatization of community
property because as legal entities the government and the
self-governing body of the community have equal rights. The
representative of the government Arnold Abrahamian mentioned that
there is no disagreement between the law and the civil code. First of
all, the property of the community is privatized by the authorized
body of the government by the consent of the community council only,
and the sum is transferred to the budget of the community. Besides,
according to Abrahamian, if the blocks of apartments are concerned,
the property should be privatized by the condominiums and not the
community. Third, according to A. Abrahamian, the law will be late as
about 420 units have already been privatized in Stepanakert and only
35 rented areas remain. Opposing to this statement, member of
parliament M. Danielian mentioned he cannot understand the intention
of the government to privatize all the units belonging to the
communities. Member of parliament Artur Mossiyan reminded that the
Audit Inspection Chamber revealed cases of privatization without the
consent of the community council. According to member of parliament
Kamo Barseghian, there were also cases when the joint-stock companies
were nationalized and then privatized. Summing up, the speaker of the
National Assembly Oleg Yessayan mentioned that the question raised is
conceptual, there is, in fact, legislative controversy and the state,
personal and community properties should be distinguished. The author
of the undertaking Edward Aghabekian mentioned in his concluding
speech that there is no need for the government to confirm the
decision of the community council because these are equal subjects.
Besides, if the personal and community property is registered and has
corresponding documents, the state property is not registered
anywhere. The bill, actually, contains the requirement that the
community should privatize the property of the community. According to
the government, the situation is exactly like this, the government
merely carries out technical work. The law was adopted at the first
reading. It is expected that before the second reading clear
mechanisms will have been worked out.

NAIRA HAYRUMIAN