Social Security Official Creates New Scandal; Government Reshuffles Possible

The newspaper “168 Hours” reports: “State officials have started writing against each other on Facebook. Recently, the Deputy Head of the Social Security Service (SSS), former activist Arsen Ohanyan, announced publicly that there is internal tension within the state system. Regardless of the content of the official’s post, the phenomenon itself speaks to the critical issue that the situation within the state management circles has gotten out of ‘control’, and the dog does not recognize its master. The real question is why a public servant is making this issue public, especially a ‘revolutionary’ official against his ‘revolutionary’ leader.

It should be noted that the situation has escalated because two conflicting revolutionary newcomers—SSS Head Suren Ghamaberyan and his deputy Arsen Ohanyan—are at odds with each other. Their superior, Minister of Labor and Social Affairs Zaruhi Batoyan, admitted in an interview with 168.am that these processes are not new and characterized the situation as very serious. Contrary to the deputy’s assertions that there are issues in his post, the minister stated that the tension between SSS Head Suren Ghamaberyan and Deputy Arsen Ohanyan is purely professional in nature and began due to the head's dissatisfaction with the deputy’s ineffective work.

Ghamaberyan is dissatisfied with the work quality of Deputy Arsen Ohanyan and Head of Staff Vanik Babajanyan, and has reported this to Minister Batoyan. Batoyan also confessed in our conversation that Ghamaberyan has approached her several times with the same problems, after which she personally heard from all sides, including the head of the service, and is still contemplating how to resolve the issue. It appears that the minister has been fully aware of the internal disputes within the service but has been unable to take control of the situation or feels somewhat constrained.

As is well-known, Zaruhi Batoyan is very close to the former head of the service, the former ruling party member Arman Boshdyan, who is currently a member of parliament within the ruling ‘My Step’ alliance. Both Arsen Ohanyan and Vanik Babajanyan are among the personnel brought by him. Perhaps this is why the dissatisfaction of SSS Head Suren Ghamaberyan has openly reached the Prime Minister today, as the ‘ineffective’ officials Arsen Ohanyan and Vanik Babajanyan have presented themselves as victims of the situation by publicizing their grievances on Facebook. It is expected that the Prime Minister will sign dismissal requests today.

Whom will he prefer to keep in the system—the Soros-backed deputy, who, apart from scandalous incidents, has yet to prove himself in other areas, or the head dissatisfied with his ineffective work, whom the Prime Minister appointed in March 2019? An interesting detail: Arsen Ohanyan, who erupted on Facebook due to the head’s pressure, was at one time in Russia wanted by law enforcement for theft charges at the moment of his appointment to a state position. It should be noted that we have not found confirmations of his criminal case being dismissed from either the RA Prosecutor General’s Office or in any published materials thus far.

In fact, at that time, the head of the SSS, Arman Boshdyan, introduced the candidacy of a person accused of computer theft in Russia for the position of Minister Mane Tandilyan—disregarding the candidate’s past or, possibly, being fully aware, he avoided the topic because, for the sake of friendship, it was necessary to allocate Arsen Ohanyan to the deputy position at all costs.

We attempted to understand the reasons behind the internal disputes and the rebellion of these two officials against the head of the service with several internal inquiries, but the hypotheses were few, primarily emphasizing that the unrest is within the head-deputy context, and that the disagreements among the newcomers are merely professional in nature. According to service employees, activist Arsen Ohanyan has not moved beyond blocking streets and does not comprehend the seriousness and responsibility of the service as a state official during his year of service, while the head of the service continues to impose heavy workloads on him, which has led to the eruption on Facebook.

Employees also recount that Arsen Ohanyan has teamed up with Vanik Babajanyan, creating a tense atmosphere inside after the Facebook posts. We asked the employees to describe the internal tensions between the officials with more specific instances; they directed us to follow the hostile deputy's Facebook page, saying that the inappropriate behavior of a public official should have been noticed right from there before addressing them.

And as they say, the movie started right from here: on the official's page, we discovered everything from hidden propaganda regarding sexual minorities to pro-LGBT comments, as well as posts discrediting the military and mocking Christian values, which have already been noted and archived by several media outlets and users, becoming one of the most searched queries about this individual in Google’s cached memory. It appears that alongside his official duties, Arsen Ohanyan has remained an unrestrained activist in the public arena.

Within minutes, we gathered an array of the more striking examples of posts, and they are quite numerous, and as surprising as it may seem, the official has continued to express himself in the public space even during the days when he may be scrutinized as a public servant in the Prime Minister’s apparatus in order to make an objective decision.

For more details, please refer to the newspaper's issue today.