Armenia`s government violating Constitution and laws by trying to expropriate ENA - lawyer 

ArmInfo.  Today, at the initiative of the government, an extraordinary session is being convened in the National Assembly, during which they are going to implement the  illegal bill on the expropriation of Electric Networks of Armenia  CJSC. This is the opinion of constitutional law expert Gohar Meloyan. 

As she noted, for this purpose, it is envisaged to establish the  authority to appoint a temporary manager, which directly CONTRADICTS Article 60 of the Constitution of the Republic of Armenia, and is a clear deprivation of property.

According to the draft law, when appointing a temporary manager of a licensee, ALL powers of the executive body of the licensee are transferred to him, with the exception of the implementation of executive management of the licensee by the executive body of the licensee during the period specified in the decision on the appointment of the temporary manager.

During the period of activity of the temporary administrator of the licensee, other management bodies of the licensee exercise their powers with the consent of the temporary manager.

If the draft law is adopted, it will turn out that one public  official will appoint a manager of a private company, who will be  granted all the powers of the director of a private company, and the other two bodies of the three-tier corporate governance - the board and the general meeting of shareholders - will be deprived of all their powers.

That is, the shareholders of the company, as owners, and the supreme body of the company will NOT be able to independently exercise any of their more than two dozen powers stipulated by the RA Law on Joint Stock Companies, such as amending the charter, supplementing the authorized capital, changing the director, etc.

Such gross interference in its essence and nature is tantamount to depriving shareholders of their property rights, without preserving the guarantees and restrictions established by the Constitution>, - the lawyer wrote on the social network, promising to make an additional analysis of the current situation.

Pashinyan announced the need for the nationalization of the power grids immediately after the campaign against the president of the Tashir Group of Companies Samvel Karapetyan and his arrest. On June 18, the Prime Minister told journalists that the company's activities led to an energy crisis in the country caused by frequent power outages.

In this regard, on July 1-2, the National Assembly will consider a package of bills designed to launch the nationalization process of ESA. According to the amendments, the Public Services Regulatory Commission will have the right to change the company's management after conducting research and identifying violations. In this case, the PSRC will be able to invite an interim manager with at least 5 years of experience in the energy sector.

The Tashir Group of Companies, headed by Samvel Karapetyan, acquired Electric Networks of Armenia CJSC from Inter RAO in September 2015. Earlier, Samvel Karapetyan noted that since 2016, when Tashir Group of Companies acquired ownership rights to Electric Networks of Armenia, a total of about $900 million has been invested, $680 million of which was for modernization and $200 million for the creation of new capacities. Investments were made, including through credit resources of international financial institutions, which led to the pledging of 100% of the shares of the CJSC.

According to experts, attempts to nationalize ESA will lead to  capital outflow from Armenia, loss of investment attractiveness and a decrease in the country's sovereign credit rating.