Many of my friends are asking me who the author of “I know” TV campaign is. They mean the TV ads in which our compatriots ensure that “what’s hard has been eased” and then they show in detail what exactly has been eased.
For example, they don’t need psychic test documents for the issuance of a driver license. But people are trying to find out which of the benevolent organizations has taken on the duty of keeping the society aware. The question is quite natural because we all know that the ad on TV costs very expensive and they realize that an NGO wouldn’t afford to pay for these services. Many of them have even visited the website of the organization – www.esgitem.am. But they were not able to reveal the author. The website includes the text versions of 25 reforms and is also includes videos. But not everything is so address-less as it seems. Let us immediately mention that the author of the initiative is the RA government. And the implementer is Ameria consulting firm and the funder is the World Bank. The campaign was launched on February 1 for a month (we mean the videos). The goal of that is to inform the Armenian society of the achievements and 25 reforms that the government has undertaken during 2007-2012. According to the managers of the program, the citizens often collide with obstacles but when they are informed everything is done differently. Moreover, the campaign cost very expensive – approximately 100 thousand USD. Our compatriots probably haven’t been enough attentive to the official newsfeed for the beginning of February; otherwise there would be no questions. A press-conference has been held addressing this initiative. The event hosted the representatives of the government and “America.” Moreover, on February 2 during the Cabinet sitting Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan referred to this initiative and mentioned, “Starting from February 1 we have launched a wide campaign through the mass media which aims at essentially improving the quality of services provided by the state. Together with you we have been very consistent in regards to this issue. In order to complete the work it is necessary that our citizens be well informed about the services that the government provides and the changes that we are implementing to improve the quality of services and to protect their rights. It means that our citizens should be aware of the services provided by almost 18 departments. Thus, with the assistance of the World Bank we have launched a wide awareness campaign.”Mass media is going to inform our citizens about the new opportunities we have created for them, and how they can apply those opportunities. Certainly there is a little contradiction, as the goal of those reforms is not the state service quality development but raising public awareness about already developed services. By the way, those reforms do not correspond to all the 25 provisions. For instance, one of the reform points is the digitization of the RA National Gallery Fund. This is a good step, but this is the last point that our society is concerned about. There are also other reforms which might cause arguments. The video recording says that the vehicle maintenance checkup ticket is simply possible to take from the bank itself, after making the necessary payment. The ticket should immediately be pasted on the front mirror of the car. Sealing the ticket by the vehicle maintenance office is no long necessary. This somehow simplifies the drivers’ job, but on the other hand it comes to prove that the government is not primarily concerned about the technical maintenance of the vehicles, but only money accumulation to be received out of this process. However, there are also positive and really useful steps. Although there is no need to speak about them, as only 100.000 USD has been spent for just speaking about that. The thing is that most of the citizens who were more or less informed about this process immediately described it as a pre-electoral campaign, which does not follow a goal of raising public awareness, and it is simply a self-PR. The only question that our society was interested in and has been posting in every possible social websites was that this initiative had been displayed on the very eve of the parliamentary elections. No one believes in such a coincident in Armenia, especially in the pre-electoral period. People who never shared this idea were basically stating the counter-argument that the name the government and a political party are not mentioned neither in the video recording, nor in any of social websites (this was the thing we have been discussing above). However, the campaign does not address to anything from the first sight only. There are many remarks in www.esgitem.am website mostly re-directing to the government website. Some of those remarks briefly explain the reform points and provide some clarifications. There are also remarks leading into quite another place, reminding a pre-electoral poster. For example, on the website the first thing you notice is the registration of the legal entities.” In that section we also read, “it is possible to register a small business within 30 minutes by approaching to a single window or by doing it online – on report.gov.am or e-register.am.” So logically, if one follows the electronic link to register the business, he or she finds the page on the results of the activities of the Armenian government. On that page even with a magnifier it would be impossible to find any tool on how to register a business. Instead, on the upper left corner of the page we can see a part posted from the campaign platform of President Serzh Sargsyan and his photo. The results of the achievements of the government are at the bottom of the webpage. This is the main page of report.gov.am. On the content section of the website we can find the lengthy speech of Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan – on the results and prospects of the activities of the government. It is really difficult to say that this is merely campaigning on the official webpage of the government. But it’s also difficult to prove the opposite. Shortly said, the government succeeded in killing two rabbits with one shot – provide reach-out for reforms and in the meantime do some PR. Perhaps, some of our super statehood-oriented statesmen may blame us for marginality by mentioning that we only see the bad stuff in any initiative. Let’s clarify that it’s not about what we see but what the society sees. We only convey the opinion of the people about that. The ones, who really wish to learn the points of view of people, may visit different social networks and forums, such as www.akumb.am. “So why did this campaign start closer to elections especially when the official pre-election campaign hasn’t even been launched? Is this a regular awareness initiative or pre-election campaign?” asks one of the forum activists, which was followed by quite expected answers. “It’s been quite long since that initiative and similar ones are used as campaign tools. Is this the only case?” or “As usual our beloved government is cheating us in light of very costly projects, which they call reforms.” And so on. So these opinions and others, which are expressed (even on the blog of the Prime Minister) clearly show that are citizens mildly-said don’t believe the government and its steps even when those have noble and sincere goals. By the way, in the section, which shows the section from the pre-election campaign of the President we read the following on report.am.gov, “The Armenia, which are all striving for, will have a government, which enjoys the trust of the society.” Thus, the government also accepts that the formation of the atmosphere of trust is a very important factor. This is more important than the digitization of the fund of the national gallery or the elimination of the demand to submit psychic test results during the acquirement of the driver’s license. It is a matter of a subjective opinion to what extent the government succeeded in restoring the trust of the society during the past 4-5 years.