Armenian president says civil service best way to fight gangs

Armenian president says civil service best way to fight gangs

Public Television of Armenia, Yerevan
23 Mar 04

[Presenter] The law on the civil service is the best tool to fight
gangs, President Robert Kocharyan said today during a working meeting
which discussed the civil service system. According to the president’s
assessment, a civil service staff has already been formed in the
country and is performing a serious service. But the president’s
control service carried out studies of the civil service sphere for
two months and disclosed instances of abuse and breach of law.

Robert Kocharyan said that during the competitions for senior posts in
the civil service, the commissions were objective, but the
participants in the competition submitted false documents.

[Correspondent over video of session] The session chaired by the
president today discussed issues regarding the civil service system.

[Robert Kocharyan, captioned] Great work has been done in this
sphere. We have formed a serious system which is carrying out public
service and which is accepted today in all the world. We did not have
this system in our country for many years.

[Correspondent] The president’s control service studied more than 500
competitions for posts in 13 state bodies. Robert Kocharyan said that
these checks disclosed instances of abuse and breach of law.

[Robert Kocharyan] I think that this law is the best tool to fight
gangs and we shall not allow anybody to break the law. These instances
are sufficient and we have to discuss them seriously and not to allow
such instances to be repeated. We have already included changes to the
law. We have to discuss and complete this system, so that it can be
formed correctly as we planned.

[Correspondent] The chairman of the Council of the State Service,
Manvel Badalyan, presented the study results and announced that 1,022
competitions for posts had already been organized and 2,000 civil
service employees have already been certified, of whom 125 were
dismissed.

The ministers and heads of department made their observations and
suggestions for improvement of the system.

Lilit Setrakyan, “Aylur”.