Karine Simonyan

Workers from three sections of the Metal Prince Company’s Shamlugh mine have been on strike for a month now, demanding eights months’ overdue wages. Last year, twelve miners took their problem to court, and between February and July, the Alaverdi Court of First Instance found for four of them. One of these verdicts has been appealed, and the other three have yet to be carried out.

The dormant Akhtala ore mining and processing enterprise was reopened in 2000, following an agreement between the Romanian company Metal Prince and the government ofArmenia. The company invested $940,000 at the time and committed itself to an additional $2.5 million following privatization. Serob Ter-Poghosyan, the president of Metal Prince promised $100 million more during the third stage of investment. The enterprise was sold to the company in an April 2002 decision by the National Assembly, but according to Armenian legislation, Metal Prince cannot acquire property rights until all the back debts of the enterprise have been paid off.

It has been a year since the mine’s cash and accounts were frozen, which is why the three workers who won in court have yet to receive their wages. All financial operations are carried out through the bank account of Metal Prince.

Thus, the miners don’t know who to complain to--the Akhtala mine or Metal Prince. The mine as a legal entity is their employer, but on paper, it has no financial means. And Metal Prince receives the profits and participates in the management of the enterprise, but it is not a full owner since it hasn’t paid off enterprise’s previous and current debts, including 50 million drams (about $89,500) in wages and 150 million drams (about $268,500) in state debt. A former lawyer for the enterprise, Hrachya Tandilyan, sees this as “a way to purposely avoid obligations”. The mine’s former managers have tried to bring attention to the issue in an open letter addressed to the president of the republic, the speaker of parliament and the prime minister.

Vardan Papyan, the general manager of Metal Prince, told us in a phone interview that he was quite surprised to learn about the strike, and that the rumors about the debts were false. But the mine’s production manager, Levon Vardanyan, confirmed that money was owed: “The company has been paying salaries regularly for a year now. All we have is some back wages that accumulated before that time.” But miner Arthur Hakobyan assured us that he is owed three months’ pay from 2001, and that he hasn’t receive his salary since last May. He says he won’t go back to work until he gets paid.

Today work is underway to put a new mine into operation. When this happens, says the production manager, the enterprise will start working at full capacity, processing six times as much as the current 2,000 tons of ore. Until that time, he believes, the workers’ complaints are unfounded. Yet these complaints are not only related to salaries. As miner Rubik Sahakyan told us, “Working conditions in the mines are bad, we don’t work 15 or 20 days a month, but we don’t get paid for not working.” He added, “The salaries for management have gone up three times, but not for the workers, and the discrepancy between the wages is huge.” But Metal Prince’s general manager told us that information regarding salaries was the company’s business, and he refused to discuss it with us.

The government has extended the term for the paying off of back debt and the official transfer of the property to Metal Prince until November 1, 2003.