Education sphere employees protest pension reform

Employees of the education sphere and supporters of ‘I am against’ civil initiative are staging a protest against the compulsory accumulative pension system. The protest is underway outside Ministry of Education and Science in Yerevan.

“We demand that illegal compulsory pension contributions be stopped and the sums deducted in the past months be refunded. The choice of pension funds and managers should also be suspended,” a protester said.

The protesters want to meet with Education and Science Minister Armen Ashotian to express their demands. They said they will continue struggling until their demands are met.

“We demand that they meet with teachers to hear their demands. We demand creation of a ministry of social networks and Armen Ashotian’s transfer to that ministry,” a demonstrator said.

Four factions of the Armenian parliament – ARFD, Prosperous Armenia, Armenian National Congress, and Heritage factions applied earlier to the Constitutional Court, asking it to recognize some provisions of the Law on Accumulative Pensions as unconstitutional.

The Court announced a 64-page decision on April 2. Under the decision, some articles of the law are recognized as contradicting the Constitution and null and void. The Court ruled that the parliament and government shall bring the law into line with the decision by September 30.

The law took effect on January 1, 2014 and requires that all citizens born after January 1, 1974, must pay 5% of their monthly salaries to a pension fund, with the state paying another 5%, but no more than 25,000 drams.