National Assembly deputy Hakob Hakobyan (poll #26) claimed two days ago
that the deputies have not received their 13th salary given by the
government and that the National Assembly has decided to take care of
that. President of the National Assembly Artur Baghdasaryan announced
yesterday at a question and answer session that the legislative,
executive and judicial workers as well as deputies will not be
receiving their 13th salary. As for the amount received by the
government, the staff working at the National Assembly has received
that as a 13th salary.” H. Hakobyan has gone as far as to the National
Assembly department of finances to clarify what the National Assembly
was doing with that money. Artur Baghdasaryan touched upon that subject
also, claiming that he always informs the deputies about that before
and after the session. “The motives for discussing the issues
concerning salaries in the National Assembly is a totally different
issue, which we will touch upon later,” said Artur Baghdasaryan.
They really did touch upon that. After the session, while Andranik
Markaryan was answering some questions for journalists, H. Hakobyan and
staff director of the National Assembly Hayk Kotanyan left the session
hall yelling and insulting each other without taking into consideration
the presence of the Prime Minister (before this H. Hakobyan and H.
Kotanyan were talking with A. Baghdasaryan). “Hey you idiot, I’ll kill
you….” This was a threat to H. Hakobyan made by Kotanyan. Tigran
Torosyan’s efforts to calm Hakobyan down were useless. The Prime
Minister was forced to end the interview and called Hakobyan to the
“Hanrapetakan”(Republican) political party’s office.
“Artur Baghdasaryan told me that Kotanyan has to present a financial
report, Kotanyan said to me-“I’ll give the report if I feel like it”. I
don’t understand. Is this his playground or Artur’s? What does this all
mean?” said H. Hakobyan during our conversation with him. “A week ago,
I thought that the government was supposed to pay each deputy 65,000
dollars as the 13th salary, but then the Ministry of Finances sends a
letter to the National Assembly telling them to make some changes. The
National Assembly does exactly that. They want to spend the money on
other things,” affirmed the deputy. Do you know what the National
Assembly staff will do with the money foreseen for the 131 deputies? In
response to this question H. Hakobyan said: “They are going to buy
Jeeps for themselves. They have formed a mafia here, my friend.”