If the word “vacant” was relative regarding other positions since they were all filled, the Department of Culture had been without a Director for more than a year. There was a feeling in the air that this position would remain vacant even after the open competition had taken place.

On June 6th my application was denied by the Municipality which argued that it hadn’t accepted any applications as well. As Mayor Hakob Shahgaldyan put it, they decided to do away with this post and that of the Head Attorney as a cost-cutting measure.

Mayor Shahgaldyan stated, “Since there’s over spending for salaries, we want to cut areas. This Department isn’t being overworked and in my view there’s no need for a Director there. We’ll keep 3-4 employees of the Department who will answer to the overall Staff Director. If the Department functions as such it will have a minimum of five employees.” He added that the monies saved could go to raising the wages of kindergarten staff. Regarding the Head Attorney position the Mayor stated that the community could function properly with just one attorney. In the words of Staff Secretary Shushanik Sargsyan, the Municipality doesn’t really need many employees and since these two posts were vacant before the competition it was decided to cut them all together. While these answers were convincing to an extent what remained somewhat incomprehensible was why hadn’t the salary overruns concerned anyone two weeks before and why had the competition been announced in the first place. In addition, the position cuts hadn’t been reviewed by the local Community Council.

My application was accepted after a series of ‘deliberations’. Minutes later a Council session was convened which didn’t have the matter of position cuts included in its agenda. Days later it was revealed that the Council “unanimously” decided to consent to cutting those two positions.

When we attempted to get Council members to explain their reasoning for such a decision, they essentially avoided the question. Councilman Saribek Stepanyan said that, “We were of the opinion that it was the correct thing to do.” “We consented in order to cut extra costs but later the guys in the Council got together and came to the conclusion that our Municipality needs a Department Director. We will definitely raise the matter in our upcoming session” stated Norayr Vardanyan who quickly corrected himself by adding that this was his personal opinion. We also heard Councilman Anatoly Gasparyan voice a similar explanation.

Who or what were the reasons that forced the Council members to consent to such a decision even though it appears that most were not in favor of it? It is also difficult to explain the speed with which the decision was made. In the following edition of “21st Century” there was a statement that the original job notice was in error and the Municipality subsequently petitioned the appropriate Armenian governmental body to make changes to the list of names.

 Article 14 of The Republic of Armenia law regarding ‘Community Employment’ state that, “In order to fill vacant position in their communities, local leaders must publicly announce employment competitions not later than one month before in papers and other media outlets having print runs of at least one thousand.”

On June 25, 26 and 27, competitions for the 19 vacant positions took place in the Charentsavan Municipality. For all positions, except for one where two sisters competed, there was only one applicant. And in all cases, except for one where the applicant was the relative of a Municipality employee, the applicants were all current Municipality employees themselves. This was the case despite the fact there are 1,916 officially registered unemployed in the district. During the committee hearings we heard people say that perhaps local residents thought that currently employed officials had a better grasp of the requirements and thus failed to show up.

What seems more probable is that local residents were never informed of the competition. The Municipality says that it carried out the law ‘to the letter’ and that notices were published in a paper with a 2,000 circulation. But you’ll never find this paper sold in any of the town’s newsstands. Mayor Shahgaldyan explained that, “Other papers were just too expensive.” In any event the announcements could have been posted at any of notice boards located just for this purpose throughout the town and at least one public announcement could have been broadcast by the local TV station.

The issue isn’t that poor quality employees were selected but rather that the process wasn’t competitive. “It would have been better and more interesting if there were others competing with me” noted Staff Secretary Shushanik Sargsyan after winning her competition.

The Community Council as Competition Jury

The jury committee for the competition was comprised of the Mayor, Council members and three representatives of the Regional Council (Marzpetaran). Thus, the Council members held a dominant position and influence in the process. But it is impossible to speak of impartiality in the matter since, especially in the case of smaller communities, since most committee members are either the friends or relatives of the applicants.

There are two stages to the competition - a written test and an oral interview. After successfully completing the first stage the applicants must answer questions posed by the committee members limited to the specific job requirements. The written test is pretty simple while the interview stage is mostly a formality, since the possibility can’t be ruled out that prior ‘deals’ have already been struck.

In Armenia there are no educational requirements for one to be elected a Council member or Community leader. Thus in many cases such juries, whose job it is to evaluate and examine, are comprised of individuals having only a high school diploma or less. Representatives of the Regional Council really don’t have a decisive say in the matter. More than one’s qualifications being the dominant factor in the selection process, it’s the human element of remorse or sympathy that’s decisive.

What are the Bases for Evaluating the Participants

Applicants answering 75% of the written exam correctly make it to the second stage. The interview phase is marked on a twenty point scale with eight behind the lowest score one can receive. Jury members make their evaluations in secret so it is possible to give a score of one point to someone who answers all the questions correctly and vice-versa.

For example, one of the participants from Charentsavan, who couldn’t answer any of the questions posed to him, received the following grades - 1, 3, 3, 3, 5, 7, 7. 7. 8, 13, 14, 20, 20. Basically an evaluation system left to the whim of the moment and the jury members. However, it must be noted that the otherwise like-minded Mayor and Council, couldn’t reach a common consensus in this case.

One more observation - even if more than half of the jury members gave unsatisfactory marks to a competition participant that individual’s prospects can be greatly improved with a perfect score of twenty by just one or two jurors. This is particularly the case when there’s no real competition involved.