RA OMBUDSMAN TRIES TO DEFEND RIGHTS OF HIS STAFF

Noyan Tapan
Oct 30, 2008

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 30, NOYAN TAPAN. Although the RA Ombudsman submitted
a bid to increase allocations to his office by 50-60 mln drams with
the aim of raising the salaries of employees of his office by 50%,
the government left the allocations at the previous level in the 2009
draft state budget. The deputy minister of finance Pavel Safarian
said at a joint sitting of the NA standing committees that no change
in salaries is envisaged in the bodies elected by the parliament.

In the words of the RA Ombudsman Armen Harutyunian, increasing the
salaries of the employees of the RA Ombudsman Office is not only a
financial but also a political problem, and his task is to equalize
actually the status of the body headed by him with that of the other
bodies elected by the National Assembly. Admitting the fact that the
salaries of employees of the Constitutional Court and the Control
Chamber did not change either, he at the same time mentioned that
the actual salaries of the heads and employees of the indicated
structures are 2-3 times higher as a result of their additional
payments. A. Harutyunian said 5 employees of his 40-member staff
left thier jobs, while another two are going to change their jobs. He
pointed out that the reason is not only low salaries but also the fact
that the years of work at the RA Ombudsman Office are not included
in employees’ length of service. The RA Ombudsman informed those
present that he repeatedly raised the problem at all the levels but
he was told that this is a problem of a political decision, and all
the promises to deal with it were not kept.

The NA deputy Rafik Petrosian said that under the Law on Ombudsman,
the ombudsman shall submit a bid on financing the Ombudsman Office,
and the amount of the financing requested by the ombudsman shall be
indicated in the draft budget. If the government has any ojections, its
representative must substantiate these objections during discussions
at the parliament. The same law stipulates that the Ombudsman’s salary
shall be equal to that of the Chairman of the Constitutional Court.