Charentsavan resident Tatul Ivanyan states, “The Charentsavan Municipality has grabbed my land.”The resident first got wind that something wrong was going on when he refused to sell his gas station located on Shahumyan Street to Charentsavan architect Vahe Hakobyan. Afterwards the architect stated that a parcel of the land no longer belonged to Mr. Ivanyan, whether he liked it or not. “A few guys started to fence off the 40 square meter parcel as a preliminary construction step. I was surprised to learn that the property was sold to them given the fact that I’ve owned the land since 2003 when I signed a contract with the Municipality.” stated Mr. Ivanyan.

Mr. Ivanyan signed a deal to occupy the 130 square meter site with the former Charentsavan authorities. Both the State Committee of the Real Estate Cadastre and the Municipality’s City Construction Division transferred both the land and the real estate over to the possession of Mr. Ivanyan for a period of ten years. Mr. Ivanyan chalks up the two attempts on the part of the Municipality to sell the land to different buyers as a misunderstanding and has gone to the current Charentsavan architect Vahe Hakobyan for clarification. The architect claims that he has no knowledge of the sale. The sale was conducted by Hakob Shahgaldyan, the present Mayor of Charentsavan.

Mr. Ivanyan petitions Mayor Shahgaldyan. Even though the Mayor states that he is willing to review the matter and offer the buyers another piece of property he does nothing after summoning Mr. Ivanyan to his office for ten days straight. Mr. Ivanyan is then forced to seek redress form the state government and he is informed that an answer to his petition will be forwarded to the Kotayk Marzpetaran (Regional Office) within seven days. “I really didn’t expect much from the Marzpetaran since the Marzpet (Regional Governor), Kovalenko Shahgaldyan is the Mayor’s father and one of the officials on the Board of Administration, Samvel Hakobyan, is the father of Vahe Hakobyan, the architect. It would be laughable to think that the problems of an average citizen could be resolved given such a web of family ties, especially since it’s these authorities who created the mess in the first place. Yeah, some guys from the Marzpetaran came and took more measurements but in the end, as I expected, they stated that all was in order and considered the case closed.” Mr Ivanyan recounted. He also sent of a letter to the Inspectorate Division attached to the President of Armenia. Contrary to his other petition, this time they sent a team to Charentsavan to inspect the matter on-site. Mayor Shahgaldyan stated that, “Mr. D. Nazaryan from the Inspectorate, with ruler in hand, personally made measurements and came up with no violations.”Mr. Ivanyan however claims that the Inspectorate representative did come up with discrepancies between his findings and the actions of the Municipality. In particular, the representative found that the parcel has been increased in size, a ploy which discreetly covers any violations and more importantly, which allowed the Mayor to sell a parcel of land doubled in actual size, thus violating the rights of Mr. Ivanyan.

Charentsavan Mayor Shahgaldyan refutes as baseless the charges levied at him by Mr. Ivanyan claiming that, “The land auction was duly publicized and Mr. Ivanyan was also invited to attend. We also suggested that he purchase the land but he refused saying that he didn’t have the funds. So what violations are we talking about?” Mr. Ivanyan claims the exact opposite, “That’s the same fairy tale the Mayor told to Mr. Nazaryan, the Inspectorate representative. When I demanded, after patiently listening to him, whether he was ready to swear, on all he held holy, that what he said was true, he threatened to hit me on the head with the telephone receiver. If there weren’t any violations why did Mr. Nazaryan propose a compromise to me; stating that I should agree to take another piece of land in return. But I was adamant that my land should be left to me, even if they spent money on it and construction had started. I even told them that I was willing to pay those costs, but who listened?”

It’s been five months now that Tatul Ivanyan’s case has been bounced from one government department to another. None can state with any certainty who is in the right. Rather, those in the know expect that Mr. Ivanyan’s son, a rank and file employee of the Charentsavan Police Department, who soon be looking for a new job.