Saturday, August 29 2015 05:55

"We have relaunched our street struggle against the energy price hike. We are urging all those who are against it to gather in Lovers' Park on Sep 1 at 4 pm local time", Mihran Avagyan, Artush Chibukhchyan and Artur Kocharyan, the member of the civilian initiative "No to Plunder!", said during an Aug 28 press conference. 

The activists claim they have suspended their rallies to understand what results the president's suggested audit will have. They have realized they have been deceived once again. The movement members are calling upon small and medium-sized enterprises not to sign contracts with the ENA. The activists are claiming they will stick to their guns this time and will not make the same mistakes. 

During the Aug 13 governmental meeting PM Hovik Abrahamyan said that big business would not be subsidized for energy price hike. Despite the general public opinion that big business will also get subsidies along with the population it will not happen for the government is also trying to ease the situation of small and medium-scale businesses. The PM does not think that the government should also fund big businesses.  To note, on June 17 the Public Services Regulatory Commission took a decision to the electric power tariffs by 6.93 AMD starting from August 1. As a result, the daytime tariff for the ultimate consumers will rise from the current 41.85 AMD per 1kWh to 48.78 AMD, and the nighttime tariff will grow from 31.85 AMD to 38.78 AMD per 1 kWh (including VAT). ENA CJSC had insisted on 17 AMD rise in the tariffs because of the company's debts. This decision has sparked public protests in the country.  The decision even angered the political and public organizations and the opposition forces of Armenia that blame ENA for mismanagement.  The Company, in turn, does not guarantee uninterrupted power supply to the country, unless the power rate is increased by 17 AMD. On June 27, Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan said that the Armenian Government would assume the burden of the raised tariffs until the ENA audit was over. He also said that the ENA might be nationalized. For his part, David Harutyunyan, Minister-Head of the Armenian Government Administration, said that the audit at the ENA might last for 3-6 months.  ENA's total debt is about 150 bln AMD.