How Bureaucratic Capitalism destroys Private Initiative

Baku/23.11.21/Turan: The rise in prices for essential goods can be stopped, and even reversed by an increase in the volume of goods in the market, which will lead to increased competition between market participants. This is an axiom of a market economy, which government agencies communicate to citizens who are tired of rising prices. One of these explanations came to the press from the State Service for Market Control and Fight Against Monopoly under the Ministry of Economy: "to regulate market prices, the state creates conditions for the development of competitive relations." In the message of the state department, the "Law on Antimonopoly Activity" is mentioned several times.

In Azerbaijani reality, and not in official reports, we see something else: state bodies act against the abundance of commodities, do not allow private companies to work, create preferential conditions for companies owned by civil servants, deputies or members of their families.

Orhan Ismayilov, the founder and director of the Ganja company Finest Tobacco MMC, who has sent a letter to Turan, has been fighting with government agencies for the right to import and sell tobacco products in Azerbaijan without bribes and freely, on a legal basis. He recently lost a lawsuit in Ganja, demanding from Aztelekom LLC to stop monopoly activities that lead to poor quality Internet in Ganja. Turan reported about this in an article entitled "The court in Ganja rejected the charges of a citizen against the monopolist of Internet services - Aztelekom" . Ismayilov intends to achieve justice in the courts of the following instances.

Finest Tobacco on a contractual basis imported cigarettes from the Republic of Belarus made there from Azerbaijani raw materials (we will return to this nuance later). Started organizing the wholesale. But, according to Orhan Ismayilov, since December 2020, the company cannot receive excise stamps from the Ministry of Finance, without which the legal import and sale of cigarettes is impossible. The company sent an appeal with a request to issue them stamps to the Ministry of Finance on 23.12.2020.

In correspondence and oral conversations with officials, it turns out that there are no excise stamps in the Ministry of Finance, because the State Tax Service under the Ministry of Economy did not agree with the Ministry of Finance on the order for these stamps, that is, it did not present the draft protocol to the financiers. The head of the tax policy and profit department of the Ministry of Finance, Fikret Shirinov, informed the director of the company in a letter dated May 5, 2021.

The second reason for the blocking of Finest Tobacco's activities is that the tax audit carried out by the tax authorities in the company was completed on April 30, 2021, but the results of the audit have not been reported to the Ministry of Finance until today. What prevents the tax authorities from sending an electronic file with the results of the audit to the Ministry of Finance? Maybe it is hindered by the fact that the official result of the audit is "zero violations", which was notified to Finest Tobacco on the form of the tax service in the act of 03.18.2021 and 04.30.2021?

Turan has electronic copies of about 40 documents on the Finest Tobacco MMC case, among which there is an official conclusion on the absence of violations in the work of this company.

As a result of disregard by the state authorities of the legal rights of a private company, Finest Tobacco cannot fulfill the contractual obligations concluded with the tobacco factory OJSC GTF “Neman”, the city of Grodno, Republic of Belarus. Although just in pursuance of the Azerbaijani-Belarusian interstate agreements, this factory purchased Azerbaijani tobacco leaf, and Finest Tobacco entered into an agreement with the factory for the import of finished products to Azerbaijan.

The embassy of Belarus in Azerbaijan and the factory of OJSC GTF "Neman", officials from the Presidential Administration and the government of Azerbaijan have joined in a simple and at the same time confusing case in Azerbaijan.

Orhan Ismayilov's folder contains dozens of signed appeals and responses, and they cannot import the next batch of cigarettes. The company suffers losses, it is forced to fire workers - the only breadwinners of their families.

What is the unspoken and decisive reason for the blocking of Finest Tobacco MMC?

The reason is known, it was not disclosed in official documents, but in telephone conversations with Orhan Ismayilov, in particular, according to Orhan Ismayilov, in his last telephone conversation with the head of the Main Directorate for Control over the Turnover of Excisable Goods under the State Tax Service Azer Suleymanov dated 22.11.2021, he is informed that the company he heads operates in the unspoken commercial sphere of a tobacco sales monopoly. Ismayilov is insistently demanded to declare and admit violations in his business, although, judging by the official report of the tax service, there are simply no such violations.

The Azerbaijani tobacco monopoly is protected by officials, the economist Azer Mehdiyev reported in his publication.

"The problem is also that the monopoly on cigarettes depends on the attention of some officials. Thus, it can be assumed that there is no desire on their part to normally regulate the prices of tobacco products," Mehdiyev emphasized.

Ismayilov collected information about the tobacco monopoly - Tabaterra CJSC, in whose management Elman Javanshir is represented. His name is mentioned in connection with the deputy Javanshir Feyziyev. On November 4 of this year, a London court considered a claim for the arrest of 15.3 million pounds belonging to the deputy of the Milli Mejlis Feyziyev.

On Monday morning, Turan sent emails to the Ministry of Finance and the Internal Revenue Service, asking them to answer a question about the reason for not issuing excise stamps to Finest Tobacco. No replies came from the above-mentioned departments. Turan is ready to publish the answers of the Ministry of Finance and the Tax Service, if, of course, it receives them. — 0—