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“No to Plunder’, a civic initiative that organized mass protests in June against a rise in electricity tariffs in Armenia, will restart their street struggle on September 1, the initiative member Artush Chibukhchyan told a press conference today.

“We are going to restart our street struggle because we have no expectations from the upcoming audit of Electric Networks of Armenia (ENA) Company,” he said.

In the activists’ words, they are prepared to struggle till the end to demand the cancelation of the decision on the power tariff hike in Armenia.

The initiative members expressed their resentment over the fact that the Armenian government has no intention of subsidizing the increase in power price for big businesses.

The fact is Armenian Prime Minister Hovik Abrahamyan said at the August 13 session of the government: “Many have a wrong impression the government is ready to subsidize the 6.93 dram increase in electricity tariffs not only for population, but also for big businesses. That’s not so”. “The president said the government will shoulder the burden of the tariff rise for population. The president will soon return from vacation and we will discuss the issue of support for small and medium businesses,” the PM said.

The hiked electricity tariffs came into effect in Armenia on August 1. Earlier, Electric Networks of Armenia (ENA) Company filed an application to Public Services Regulatory Commission of Armenia (PSRC) regarding an increase in electricity tariffs, a hike that the parliamentary opposition and civil society considered as unfounded and serving the interests of ENA. Until August 1, 2015 the daytime and night tariffs for population were 41.85 drams and 31.85 drams per KWh, respectively. The ENA proposed raising the tariffs to 58 and 48 drams respectively. But on June 17 the Commission granted only partly the ENA application on a rise in tariffs. The power tariffs in Armenia have increased by 6.93 drams, not 17 drams.

As was reported, President Serzh Sargsyan said at the June 27 consultation with officials responsible for the economic policy in Armenia that cancelling the decision on power tariff rise was “very dangerous”. For this reason the government will cover the tariff rise until the conclusion (of an audit of Electric Networks – editor), he said. “If that conclusion [of the audit] confirms the price increase is well-based, from that moment on the consumers will begin paying the new tariff without having any suspicions. Should the conclusion confirm the increase had been groundless, the government would take measures to get refunds from the ENA on the amount surcharged, as well as bring to account those officials that failed on their duties»,” the president said noting that under such conditions the work that the government started a few months ago to change the owner of ENA will become a certainty, and the option of returning the company to the state and transferring it for competitive management is not ruled out.