“Zhamanak” comments on opposition-leaning Prosperous Armenia Party leader Gagik Tsarukian’s statements about the need for eliminating monopolies in Armenia. “Undoubtedly, monopolies have been causing great damage to Armenia. But Tsarukian, who speaks against monopolies today, continues to benefit from his monopolistic positions. His monopoly is limited to Yerevan. But considering the fact that under the current legislation gambling cannot be organized on the outskirts of the city, but should be organized only in Tsaghkadzor, Jermuk, Sevan and Meghri, then the monopoly in Yerevan also offers quite an advantage,” the paper observes.
“Haykakan Zhamanak” carries a front-page photograph of the administrative building of the National Security Council, writing: “This magnificent edifice, as the then secretary of the National Security Council Artur Baghdasarian described it during the ceremonial opening, cost the taxpayers 600 million AMD (about $1.5 million). But for six months [after Baghdasarian’s resignation] the National Security Council has been idling. Officials from different state departments were wondering, jokingly, whether the Council was working when we tried to learn something about the structure.”
“Zhoghovurd” presents the following evidence of the malady of the Armenian economy: “According to the list of top 1,000 taxpayers of Armenia that was published yesterday, during the first nine months of this year the three largest taxpayers in the country were Gazprom-Armenia, VivaCell-MTS and Alex Grig, the latter being a company owned by lawmaker Samvel Alexanian. In the case with the first two companies the circumstance of their being large taxpayers is natural and understandable, but the third company, Alex Grig, is engaged in a goods importing business. In other words, it has large revenues without, in fact, producing anything.”
(Hovannes Movsisian)