Azernews.Az

By Mushvig Mehdiyev

There is an iron principle that things may lost their significance or simply become useless when they are in their wrong positions. To be more correct, to keep the right order the things should be in their right places. The recent parliamentary smartphone show in the post-Soviet country raised questions over functionality of the legislative chamber.

The parliament when the nation's law makers convene to foster the country's further development and ensure prosperity of the people has turned the very place of entertainment for legislators in Armenia

The latest session of the Armenian parliament resembled a park full of buoyant teenagers rather than a strict government body which is the second most authoritative power in the country.

The session witnessed the parliamentarians being busy with their latest model mobile phones, as the state-level gathering seemed to be boring for them. Legislators from primarily the ruling Republican Party were the main "heroes" with the smartphones in their hands turning a deaf ear to speaker's addresses.

Playing games on cell phones, chatting, reading social network news feeds helped the members of parliament to spend the dull time until the session's end. Almost none of the ruling party representatives attached interest in discussion of the issues on agenda.

Parliamentarian Samvel Farmanyan, for instance, was extremely busy with checking a bookmaker web-site on his phone, supposedly tracking his online bet.

It was made obvious that Prime Minister Hovik Abrahamyan was also an addict of his smartphone as throughout the whole session he even did not raise his head from the phone's display. He was apparently sending and receiving messages. High-ranking officials could send or receive important information via cell phone, it's normal. But, looking at Abrahamyan's smartphone display at the camera allows to say that he was just killing the mandatory time period he should spend at the parliament.

Simultaneously with the debates at the parliament, almost all of the ruling party devotees were busy with their mobile phones - some were talking, some others were chatting or looking through the photos.

One of the interesting moments was a messaging and mutual gestures between Abrahamyan and Farmaynan. Probably, they have both bet on the same football matches of yesterday's EURO 2016 Qualifying.

Transport Minister Gagik Belgaryan showed the photos, probably photos of his relatives, to his colleague sitting next to him. Because of the boredom, he even tried to test his artistic skills and drew a picture on his phone.

While the brand new smartphones captivated the legislators, Parliamentary Speaker Galust Sahakyan was in a tense effort to preside the session and to end it as soon as possible being deprived of the parliamentarians' interest and attention.

Activity of the members of Armenian parliament have periodically raised concerns and doubts in view of pursuing justice at the legislative body given the passive involvement of majority of legislators during the session discussions.

Member of Parliament, Aram Manukyan said that the parliamentary majority acts not on their own will, but obeys to the authority.

Manukyan claims that the majority of Armenian legislators hold by the ruling Republican party members have a mandatory job in the chamber -- push their voting buttons, oftentimes to push the "yes" button in favor of government bills. Pushing the "yes" button is their obligation defined by the Republican party authority, in other words by President Serzh Sargsyan, believes Manukyan.

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