Thursday, April 10 2014

Not transition to the parliamentary government system in Armenia but reforming of the current system is the key task, chairman of the Constitutional Court, Gagik Harutyunyan, told journalists today. 

'The project of the constitutional reforms conception does not foresee transition to the parliamentary government system. First of all, reforming of the current system is foreseen. The project presents in details the available problems and the ways of their resolving. The key problem of constitutionality is harmonization of the system  function-institute-authority and harmonization of the functional authorities with retaliatory authorities. If we try to assess today's situation in the country, we shall see numerous shortcoming including at the level of constitutional decisions", - he said. 

To note, the Presidential Committee for Constitutional Reform has made public a preliminary concept of the project of constitutional reforms that feature transition to the parliamentary system of government in Armenia. The document, particularly, calls to expand the parliament's supervisory powers, authorize the legislative body to elect the president for a 7-year term. The authors of the project offer changes to the system of the presidential election. The presidential contenders must be non-party men, which will make them impartial arbiters for the legislative and executive powers. The new reforms will give the president a role of an arbiter with no executive powers. The authors of the project of constitutional reform explain such 'innovations' with the intention to de-monopolize the power, as a super-powerful president enjoying the support of the parliamentary majority inherently grasps the power. 

Harutyunyan said that several members of the Commission said that there are problems which may be resolved if we have another government system. "The Commission has come to the conclusion to submit as an alternative the options of effective resolving of the available problems during the parliamentary government system. It is very much important to us to know the public reaction at this matter. The reforms cannot be effective without the strict position of the political system and political forces", - Harutyunyan said. 

To recall, today when meeting members of the Commission for drawing out constitutional reforms, President of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan said he is not going to run for president any more. He also added that at present the mixed government system is the most beneficial for Armenia. However, for easy holding of the public hearings on the draft constitutional reforms submitted by the Commission, Sargsyan has officially declared that he will never run for president. "And even if as a result of public discussions a decision will be adopted to pass to the parliamentary government system, I will not pretend to the position of the premier either", - Sargsyan said.