YEREVAN. – The “Dem.Am [I am against]” civic initiative, which opposes the mandatory component of the new funded pension law in Armenia, has not received an invitation to the discussion which is held at present at the Government building, and with respect to the mandatory component of this law.  

The initiative members told the aforesaid to Armenian News-NEWS.am.

“We learned about the meeting from the media,” they added, but did not wish to comment on PM Hovik Abrahamyan’s current talk with the five parliamentary forces. 

On April 18, the “Dem.Am” civic initiative members assembled outside the Presidential Palace, to demand from the President to carry out the CC’s April 2 ruling. Subsequently, newly appointed PM Hovik Abrahamyan came to speak with the activists, and he pledged to make a decision that will be to the people’s liking. In addition, the PM proposed to discuss, with a ten-member delegation, the pension issue, but the initiative members refused.  

On April 2, the Constitutional Court (CC) of Armenia declared unconstitutional a whole series of articles in the new Law on Funded Pensions. Despite this ruling, however, the state-run financial institutions still oblige the employers to make mandatory funded pension cuts from the salaries of their employees. The respective reasoning is that the CC gave the parliament and the government until September 30 to amend the aforesaid law’s provisions that were deemed unconstitutional.