Yerevan ex-mayor lashes out at incumbent authorities over orice rise 

ArmInfo. The Civil Contract faction once again demonstrates that it knows only one form of government: constant increase in tax collection from citizens,  thereby creating the appearance of economic stability and growth.

Thus, former Yerevan Mayor Hayk Marutyan commented on the new  decision of the ruling Civil Contract faction to increase the fee for  garbage collection in Yerevan depending on living space.

"Before the New Year, the Yerevan city authorities made a new "gift"  to residents and made another decision on an unjustified increase in  prices: the State Duma Council of Elders faction today confirmed the  decision to actually increase the fee for garbage collection, and  contrary to the court decision, confirmation of the increase in  prices for "red lines", - Marutyan wrote.

The former head of the capital's municipality explained that the city  hall's attempts to raise transport tariffs, property tax, turnover  tax and other fees have only one goal - to continue the financial  robbery by the ruling force at the state level. At the same time,  Marutyan expressed his conviction that the "State Duma" faction is  raising prices with the support of its allies, the leaders of the  "Republic" party Aram Sargsyan and Artak Zeynalyan, as well as the  remaining members of the "Public Voice" faction.

The Yerevan Municipality presented a new method for calculating  garbage collection fees, which is based not on the number of  residents, as before, but on the area of the occupied residential  property. As Acting Head of the Yerevan City Hall Department for  Accounting and Collection of Revenues David Hakobyan noted during a  meeting of the Council of Elders, a similar approach is currently  applied to buildings of public and industrial significance.

It is noteworthy that according to the current order, in Yerevan, the  per capita fee for garbage removal is 200 drams per month. However,  the vice-mayor presented his own tariff scale, which diverges from  the real one, noting that in one-room apartments in Yerevan, as a  rule, 2 people live, and garbage removal for them in this case will  increase from 400 drams to 455 drams, in a two-room apartment - 3  people, and the fee will increase from 600 drams to 689 drams, for  residents of three-room apartments - from 900 drams to 975 drams, for  residents of four-room apartments - from 1200 drams to 1287 drams.

Further, he assured that the service for residents of the capital  will increase in price by 80 drams, in the case of private houses -  by 180 drams. Meanwhile, this is an outright lie and manipulation of  figures. For clarity, let's present simple arithmetic calculations:  today, an ordinary resident of Yerevan pays 200 drams for garbage,  which is equal to 2,400 drams per year. According to the new  initiative of the capital's mayor's office, an ordinary citizen will  pay from 455 drams to 1,287 drams, that is, from 5,460 drams to  15,444 drams per year. It turns out that for an ordinary citizen,  garbage removal will increase in price not by 80 drams or 15%, as the  mayor's office assures, but by 2.2 times or 215%. At the same time,  the Yerevan mayor's office did not report whether they did an  analysis of how their innovations will affect the population living  below the poverty line. It is no secret that by simultaneously  increasing tariffs for a number of services, by two, three, or even  six times, they hit the pockets of, first and foremost, the poorest  segment of the population.

According to the Statistical Committee, in 2023 the overall poverty  rate in Armenia allegedly decreased slightly from 24.8% to 23.7%.  Moreover, in rural areas of Armenia the poverty rate is significantly  higher than in cities. The Statistical Committee calculates the  overall poverty rate using the average indicator between the extreme  poverty line (minimum food basket) and the upper line (food basket  plus expenses on non-food products, utilities and other services). It  is based on the methodology of the World Bank, not the RA Ministry of  Health. According to the methodology of the Ministry of Health, the  food basket includes more products and costs about 41.7 thousand  drams (about $ 105), while the basket according to the World Bank  methodology costs just over 37 thousand drams (slightly less than $  95). 

Meanwhile, independent experts are inclined to believe that the  Armenian authorities live by myths, and the presented statistics, to  put it mildly, are far from reality. After all, about 45% of the poor  population is extremely close to absolute poverty, and the  above-mentioned figures from the Statistical Committee are at odds  with the real picture in the country, especially against the backdrop  of high inflation.