LEVON TER-PETROSIAN PROMISES TO DOUBLE COUNTRY’S GDP, INCREASE THREEFOLD STATE BUDGET AND AVERAGE SALARY AND RAISE FOURFOLD AVERAGE PENSION

Noyan Tapan
Jan 9, 2008

YEREVAN, JANUARY 9, NOYAN TAPAN. "I do not think that there are
any grounds for linking the hopes of fulfilling the most modest
expectations of the people with the current authorities as in the
last ten years they have not taken any step in this direction but,
quite the opposite, they have condemned the people to absolute slavery,
abusing its natural right to lead a dignified life and desecrating all
its sanctuaries and moral principles," is said in the pre-election
program of the first Armenian president, a candidate for presidency
in the upcoming presidential elections Levon Ter-Petrosian. The
pre-election program was submitted to the press on January 7. Below
is an extract from the final part of the program.

"The sketch of a normal country – in political language:

1. The priority tasks to be carried out by the future president of
the Republic of Armenia in the sphere of home policy:

– Restoration of the constitutional order, that is, formation of
power exclusively through free elections

– Liquidation of the current pyramidal robber-state system, ensuring
the independence and equality of the legislative, executive and
judicial powers

– Establishment of full democracy, guaranteeing of the freedon
of speech, press and conscience, and the final introduction of a
multi-party system and parliamentarism

– Consolidation of civil society institutions: local government bodies,
trade unions, creative unions and NGOs

– Exclusion of the practice of involvement of law enforcement bodies
and army in politics

– Elimination of unnecessary administrative units and reduction of the
state machinery which has been unduly increased in the past ten years

2. The most important tasks facing the new authorities of Armenia in
the sphere of foreign policy are:

– Restoration of a balanced and constructive diplomacy based on
national interests, seeking friendship and mutualy beneficial
cooperation with all countries

– Fulfilment of the obligations to international organizations,
reasserting the commitment to all the interstate agreements signed
previously

– Strengthening and deepening of good-neighbourly relations with
direct neighbors – Russia, Georgia, Iran, and making constructive
efforts to settle relations with Turkey and Azerbaijan

– Overcoming the political and economic isolation of Armenia and
increasing the country’s involvement in international and regional
economic systems

– Manifestation of political will in the settlement of the Nagorno
Karabakh conflict by taking an attitude of defending the Artsakh
Armenians’ right of self-determination and seeking a compromise
solution to the problem.

3. In the issue of restoration of rule of law, it is envisaged to
take the following urgent measures aimed at establishing a legal state
and improving the moral and psychological atmosphere in the country:

– Ensuring the equal protection of the law and the full independence
of courts, excluding the possibility of any pressure on judges from
other wings of power

– Extension of the powers of ombudsman with the aim of turning
this institution into a real and efficient counterbalance to state
institutions, particularly, to law enforcement bodies

– Irreconcilable fight against corruption, abuse of position, bribery,
extortion, statistical falsification, criminal and economic crimes

– Regulated confiscation of illegal arms and ammunition of the
population, the use of stricter law on organized crimes, especially
on activity of armed gangs of robbers

– Manifestation of particular attitude to notorious crimes committed in
the past: the act of terrorism of October 27, 1999, other political
murders, machinations related to gasoline and gas import, abuses
connected to privatization

– Consistent work in order to return the sums embezzled from the people
by the current authorities and some companies under thier patronage
to the state treasury and to use these sums to meet social needs of
the population

– Active participation in the irreconcilable fight of the international
community against terrorism, drug trafficking, money laundering and
human trafficking

– Ensuring complete lawfulness during investigation of economic crimes,
exclusion of any tendency to witch-hunt and redistribution of property

– A sharp increase of salaries of judges and employees of the police,
the security service, the prosecutor’s office, the tax inspection and
the customs committee in order to raise the efficiency of their work
and keep them from temptation to get illegal incomes

4. In the economic sphere, the major challence facing the next
authorities of Armenia is to promote industrial development and
ensure a qualitataive change in the population’s standard of living,
which is to be achieved by taking the following principal measures:

– Improvement of management, establishment of legality, adoption of
a new package of reforms, reduction of the shadow economy, or more
precisely, elimination of state racket

– Consistent use of the three main principles of market economy, which
presupposes provision of equal opportunities to economic entities,
ensuring free competition and guaranteeing the inviolability of
property

– Ensuring legality and full transparency in issues of privatization,
sale of state property and land, organization of auctions and tenders,
granting licences and building permits

– Improvement of tax legislation, extension of the tax base, even
distribution of the tax burden, inclusion of prominent businessmen
in the taxation field without distinction, continuing the use of the
Law on Simplified Tax, guaranteeing the refund of tax prepayments
and value added tax by the state

– Consistent implementation of antimonopoly policy, impermissibility
of distribution of quotas in the imported goods market and of creating
a monopoly position, use of strict legal punitive measures against
unfair competition and monopoly behavior

– Taking measures to promote production, taking into consideration,
in particular, the accounting of resources invested in fixed capital
in the cost price of the product and their exemption from profit tax,
as well as discontinuation of the practice of making prepayments from
profit tax and equalization of the interests of domestic producers
and importers

– Providing state assistance to industry based on high technologies,
particularly, for development of production and services in the sector
of information and communication technologies and for widespread
introduction of fast and accessible Internet

– Creation of infrastructures providing services to farms, that is,
systems for organization of financing of these farms, as well as
agroservice, irrigation, agricultural produce processing and selling
systems. The following additional measures aimed at developing
agriculture are envisaged: compulsory insurance of farms’ crops with
the participation of the state, abolition of value added tax (VAT)
on imported seeds and of excise tax on diesel fuel, and regular state
assistance for purchase of seeds, fertilizers and pedigree stock

– Revision of legislation on banking activity, particularly,
extension of powers of the board of the Central Bank of Armenia at
the expense of disproportionate authority reserved for its chairman,
use of less strict requirements on registration of new banks,
promotion of activities of investment funds, stock exchanges and
credit institutions.

5. In the social sphere, the activities of the new Armenian authorities
will be based on the tasks of reducing poverty, promoting employment
and increasing the birth rate. For this purpose it is envisaged to
take, first of all, the following urgent measures:

– Ensuring a steady growth of real incomes of the population,
increasing the average salary by 20% and pensions by about 30-40%
a year, as well as guaranteeing the activity of private pension funds
by the state

– A sharp increase of lump-sum payments to mothers for birth of a
child: strating from 2008, establishing a payment of 500,000 drams
for a child, a payment of 1,000,000 drams for the third child and a
payment of 1,500,000 drams for the fifth child.

– Registration of Soviet-time deposits of citizens as state bonds,
repaying them twice as much and quickly as the amounts envisaged by
the 2005 law

– Implementation of a large-scale state social program on apartment
construction (instead of promoting the so-called elite construction)
with the aim of providing gratis apartments to young or homeless
families

– Granting amnesty to nearly 20 thousand young men (as of January
1, 2005) who evaded military service and went abroad, considerable
reduction of the armed forces and a gradual transfer to contract-based
service in connection with setllement of the Nagorno Karabakh conflict

– Increasing the role and share of state programs on health care,
education and science, introduction of target financing systems,
promoting attraction of private capital, full use of the opportunities
of insurance and mortgage funds, use of mechanisms to regulate
formation of fees at higher educational institutions and control
the growth of fees, creation of a special state fund for organizing
education of gifted students of Armenian higher education institutions
in foreign countries.

Thus, by modest estimates, in accordance with the presented program on
socioeconomic development of the Republic of Armenia, it is envisaged
to double the country’s GDP, increase threefold the state budget
and the average salary and to raise fourfold the average pension
in 2008-2012. It goes without saying that more impressive results
are expected regarding settlement of the Nagorno Karabakh conflict,
lifting of the blockades and opening of the Armenian-Turkish border.

Any choice causes some tension if not a split in society. So the future
president must take serious steps from the very first day of his
activities in order to reduce this tension and create an atmosphere
of tolerance and national consolidation. I assure you that in case
of my victory I will be firmly guided by this consciousness".