YEREVAN. – The Constitutional Court (CC) of Armenia accepted the petition by four non-ruling-coalition National Assembly (NA) factions.  

CC Press Secretary Hovhannes Papikyan told the aforementioned to Armenian News-NEWS.am.

He noted that the petition is being studied at present. Subsequently, the procedure and the date for the consideration of the petition will be determined.   

As Armenian News-NEWS.am informed earlier, the four non-ruling-coalition NA factions—specifically, Armenian National Congress, Prosperous Armenia, ARF Dashnaktsutyun, and Heritage—on Monday submitted to NA Speaker Hovik Abrahamyan a petition addressed to the CC. According to the procedure, the NA is obligated to submit this petition to the CC within 24 hours. 

Representatives from the three of the four aforementioned National Assembly factions will be at the Constitutional Court. They will litigate the constitutionality of several provisions in the bill on cumulative pensions; specifically, they will demand the removal of the mandatory component from the proposed law.

On Tuesday, representatives from the above-said NA factions and several hundreds of people held a protest march toward the CC building, where they read their statement against the pension reforms. 

The new cumulative pension plan—which will come into force on January 1, 2014—will be mandatory for those born in and after 1974 and voluntary for those born before 1974. In line with this plan, 5 to 10 percent of the monthly salaries in Armenia will be deducted and mandatorily be allocated to cumulative pension funds; the latter will be reimbursed as pensions once a person turns 63 years old.