Although it was expected that the draft law on the excise tax was to be included in the parliamentary agenda as an outcome of the voting of the MPs, however yesterday it became clear that it is already included. Reminder: This law was revised on December 26 of the last year and on January 15 Serzh Sargsyan ratified it. As a result of that revision the excise tax for the imported alcoholic beverages was increased. For vodka 380 AMD per liter turned into 760 AMD, for beer 70 drams turned into 140 drams. This revision adopted in December should have been binding from March 1. But only days ago NA RPA faction chairman Galust Sahakyan and Armen Ashotyan submitted a new bill to lower this increase. They are offering to lower the tax for vodka by making it 600 instead of 760 AMD and beer 105 instead of 140 AMD. And as we informed in our previous edition the NA standing committee on financial issues was against submitting this bill to the NA discussion. But yesterday it unexpectedly turned out that the bill is already included in the agenda of the session with the positive conclusion of the bill. “What has changed?” asked the member of the Heritage faction Anahit Bakhshyan. “The attitude of the committee has changed,” answered NA chairman Hovik Abrahamyan. Let us inform that when this bill was discussed by the committee on financial issues and got rejected the chair of the committee Vardan Ayvazyan wasn’t present. He was out of the country. Instead the discussion proceeded in participation of his deputy, member of the Prosperous Armenia faction Vardan Bostanjyan. “I will definitely vote against this bill. I cannot vote for a document, which I already have voted against,” told us Vardan Bostanjyan last week. Yesterday morning the same bill was discussed by the committee in participation of Vardan Ayvazyan but this time Vardan Bostanjyan wasn’t present. Neither did he participate in the session but also refused answer phone calls. It also turned out that the Legal State faction also abruptly changed its opinion and voted for the bill. The member of the ARF faction Ara Nranyan and the Republican owner of Kilikia brewery Hakob Hakobyan voted against it. They were the authors of the previous draft. So what happened last week, which made the committee change its opinion? “It was a technical issue. It was offered to reject the bill because it was incomplete. The authors didn’t write about some provisions, which were included in the previous draft, such as the part regarding the ethyl alcohol,” answered Vardan Ayvazyan. The ones, who voted against didn’t advocate that opinion and they stipulated their decisions by the standpoints of their parties. And it’s clear that many of the committee members were offered some instructions. At any rate, it was a weird that the recently revised law, which was ratified by the president, is being amended again. Why did they end up amending it again? “As the customs rate increases a drastic difference is created between the imported and produced goods. This would create the serious criticism of international organizations. In order to avoid the difference of prices we need some correction. We were expecting support on part of international organizations. If the excise tax remains the same we may have serious issues with international structures. Therefore we tried to have a decrease of taxes by 10-15%,” says Ayvazyan. The Dashnak MPs are also against the decrease of the excise tax. According to Artsvik Minasyan although alcoholic beverages are included in the list of goods, which customs taxes must be increased. “Part 4 of Article 102 of the Customs Code 22 items are mentioned, which are defined as special and a special rate is used for them. A separate number is written in front of each good instead of its definition in percentage. And thus the increase of the excise tax will not increase the cost of their importation tax. If they had changed the special rates then vodka tax per liter would be 570 AMD and would be increased by 190 AMD. But as there is no change in the special item price list then the excise tax remains 600 AMD,” says Minasyan. At any rate, this bill has created a quite interesting but not uncommon situation at the National Assembly. This comes to prove once again that the NA merely staples the decisions of the government and the president. Otherwise, the MPs wouldn’t be made to vote against something, which they voted for 2 months ago. And the change of attitude is most unique for the RPA and Legal State factions. If the Prosperous Armenia MP Vardan Bostanjyan may get sick and not participate in the discussion or the ARF may first criticize and vote for then the RPA and the Legal State faction MPs cannot afford this luxury. And the bill will be discussed and perhaps be adopted by first or second readings maybe tomorrow in order to have it binding in April.
