Secretary of Prosperous Armenia Faction: Armenia's state budget gradually stops being property of a narrow group of people

 There are internal problems between the Government of Armenia and the Control Chamber. The Head of the Control Chamber seriously blames the government members for serious abuse and fraud, and against this background it is noteworthy that the state budget is no longer anything inviolable in the hands of a narrow group of people, Naira Zohrabyan, Secretary of the Prosperous Armenia Party (PAP) faction, told ArmInfo.   

She thinks that the abuse by the middle management could not occur without the approval of the higher management.   

Zohrabyan said that in order to eliminate the total corruption, the top leadership should display a political will, because no reports of the Control Chamber will help without the political will of the power. She stressed that if the power lacks a political will to cut off the thieves' hands, the parliamentary hearings on the Control Chamber's report will be just waste of time, a performance and a show.   

"But there is one positive thing - the large-scale abuse is spoken about in public, and this inspires hope that the situation will be improved in the future. This may give an impetus to specific measures following the public hearings", she said.

To recall, Armenian Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan said at the Government's session that the figures Ishkhan Zakaryan presents about the abuse have nothing to do with the reality. Sargsyan said that 70% of the state budget is 700 bln AMD, and if one believes the Control Chamber, it turns out that all fields experience large-scale corruption, which is impossible. In the meantime, the Premier instructed his ministers either to deny the information or to be called to account.