Armenian NGOs call for withdrawing amended draft law "On Public Organizations"

PanARMENIAN.Net - On October 5, American University's (AUA) Business Center hosted public discussion over the bill on making changes in, and amendments to, RA law "On Public Organizations". Discussion was organized upon the initiative of AUA Provost and Vice President Lucig Danielian, expert of public organizations' initiative group Arsen Stepanyan, lawyer Tachat Ter-Stepanyan and Armenian public sector representatives.



In his speech, Arsen Stepanyan criticized the draft law, noting that it received Government's approval and was sent to Parliament without public discussions. He called for withdrawing the bill and starting discussions between Government and public sector.



With regard to separate clauses contained in draft law, he pointed out the unacceptability of imposing on NGOs obligation to submit report to social security fund (in addition to Tax Service) and get it printed in newspapers which have no less than 1000 copies. The latter, he said, creates additional financial burden for organizations. "Such reports should reflect all the activities of organization, changes in its management structure and financial resources of past year," Stepanyan stressed.



In addition he said that proposed changes are difficult to bring to life, since Armenia has 6 thousand public organizations, which will be unable to submit January-March reports and get them published in papers. "It follows from here that newspapers that day should publish more 100 NGO reports," expert noted.