By Siranush Adamyan
The wife of a senior Armenian ruling party politician received more than 45.6 million drams ($118,000) in salary last year as head of the state-owned postal operator Haypost, according to her asset declaration, prompting questions over both her appointment and the lack of transparency surrounding her remuneration.
An investigation by RFE/RL's Armenian Service found that Shushan Aleksanyan, the wife of Civil Contract parliamentary faction leader Hayk Konjoryan, earned more than 3.6 million drams (about $10,000) per month after being appointed Haypost's chief executive in November 2024. Haypost is wholly owned by the Armenian government.
The investigation said neither Haypost nor the Ministry of High-Tech Industry, which exercises the government's shareholder rights in the company, disclosed how Aleksanyan was selected for the position. Requests for records of the competition, the number and identity of other applicants, and details of the company's supervisory board were either rejected or left unanswered. Haypost said information about board members constituted personal data.
The ministry also acknowledged that no separate formula, methodology or criteria exist for determining the Haypost chief executive's salary. It declined to release shareholder meeting minutes approving executive pay, describing them as commercial secrets, and refused to disclose salary data for Haypost's chief executives over the past six years.
The investigation also highlighted a deterioration in Haypost's financial performance. Revenue fell 7% to about $23.5 mn, while gross profit dropped to roughly $2.7 mn from $3.8 mn a year earlier. At the same time, the wage bill for the company's senior management rose 28.6% to about $586,000, according to the company's 2025 financial statements.
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