Yesterday president Kocharyan had a meeting with the prime minister, finance and economy minister, Police head, National Security Service head and the heads of the taxation and customs departments, where they discussed the work of the taxation and customs departments and what they have to do this year.
The president said that the purpose of the meeting just following the holydays is to return them to their work again. “Firstly, you should return to your works after the holydays, secondly, you have to work harder and be a little stricter so that you can fulfill the requirements of the budget of this year. You should provide more income to the budget and we should figure it out whether you are able to do that by improving the institutional capacity of those bodies or not” said president Kocharyan. According to the president, the main requirement is to increase the percentage of collected tax incomes compared to the GDP. “During my meeting with businessmen I said that the indexes are growing, however they are low compared to the countries of Eastern Europe, Russia and Ukraine. Starting from this year we are going to compare your work and the indexes with the indexes of those countries” noted the president.
The president also said that the inspection department of the president’s office had found out that the taxation and customs departments did not tend to developing their institutional capacity and working more effectively. “I don’t think it is a good method to check up your activities and remind you all the time that you have some lacks and should struggle to correct the situation. I don’t see enough willingness in those departments to improve the situation and work better to fight shady economy. The development is evident; however, it is not enough in the current phase. This year the government and personally I will follow your work and there will be more demand to fulfill the requirements” said president Kocharyan. The president said that the taxation and customs departments were fully reformed and improved during these three years to change their institutional appearance and improve their works. “The works that have been done so far have created an opportunity for us to improve the quality and capacity of your works. We have to continue the reformation; we have a program that was worked out by international experts jointly and your current work should be organized in parallel with that reformation process” said the RA president. At the end of the meeting the president told the chairs of the taxation and customs departments that he was going to follow their work and told them to work more effectively.