YEREVAN. – It is obvious that the situation is unpredictable, so it is necessary to give the executive power the chance to redistribute the budget. Artak Manukyan, an MP from the ruling My Step bloc, said this during Wednesday’s National Assembly special sitting debates—in the second reading—on the bill on making amendments and additions to the law on Armenia’s state budget for 2020.

The MP also referred to the proposal of the opposition Bright Armenia party to allocate 100 billion drams from the budget as aid. "As of December 31, 2019, we had a reserve of cash flows, in which the government's share was 71.8 billion drams," Manukyan said. "In 2020, we all adopted the state budget, according to which we will fund the [budget] deficit on the account of domestic resources. Now, out of those 71.8 billion drams, 47 billion drams shall be allocated for some expenses. There are 25 billion drams left. And we have adopted a legislative initiative whereby we have redistributed extra-budgetary funds. As of December 31, the 13.4 billion drams were from extra-budgetary funds, and if we remove them, only 12 billion drams will remain.”