On 4 June, the head of Armenia’s State Revenue Committee (SRC) Davit Ananyan unexpectedly resigned from his post. 

Ananyan gave no reasons for the resignation when he announced it on Facebook. “In order to end rumors circulating in the media I want to inform that today I tendered my resignation to the prime minister of Armenia. I want to thank everyone for effective and production cooperation and Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan for entrusting this important position to me for more than two years,” he wrote.

Armenia’s Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan did not immediately accept the resignation or make any statements. “There will be new changes at the SRC in the near future. We hope that the substantive changes that have begun during Mr. Ananyan's tenure will deepen further and become comprehensive,“ he said later.

Various speculations began circling around on the reasons for Ananya's resignation. According to news.am, the State Supervision Service of Armenia has been conducting studies at the State Revenue Committee for the past two weeks. The Spokesperson for the State Supervision Service Seda Aghbalyan confirmed this speculation and reported that the Monitoring Department of the Service had identified certain risks at the State Revenue Committee and had launched inspections on 12 May. It was also noted that the inspections at the State Revenue Committee began when Argishti Kyaramyan, who has held high positions in the State Revenue Committee in the past, was no longer the acting director of the State Supervision Service. 

The Armenian affiliation of the Russian newspaper “Sputnik” on the other hand speculated that the ruling Civil Contract party was unhappy with Ananyan, considering him a gentle leader who does not punish the supporters of the previous authorities. Sputnik’s article emphasized that  Ananyan once said that “not in all cases experienced specialists, even those who worked under the previous authorities, should be replaced by inexperienced personnel,”  which was a topic of constant discussions at the thematic meetings of the Civil Contract party.

The Armenian newspaper “Golos Armenii” which is known to be affiliated with the former ruling Republican party, named two possible reasons for Ananyan’s resignation. According to the article in “Golos Armenii”, the first reason might be linked to the statement of Armenia’s former ambassador to Vatican  Mikayel Minasyan that a whole plane of smuggled cigarettes was supposedly taken to Afghanistan but was envisaged for Russia and that the whole smuggling scheme was managed by members of Pashinyan's family, including his wife’s brother Hrachya Hakobyan. As an alternative explanation, the article suggested that Ananyan “sensed  an economic and tax disaster” in the country and decided to leave. The speculation relied heavily on the statements of Ananyan’s deputy Arthur Manukyan, in particular, his statement that retail sales have declined by 20% in Armenia in the past 4 months and in that time 12 000 people lost their jobs.

Later, news.am revealed that in the professional sphere, there were no problems between Ananyan and Pashinyan and that Ananyan’s resignation came as a result over “disagreements related to personal problems” and that he chose to resign himself instead to dismiss one of his employees.

Ananyan was appointed as head of the national tax and customs services in May 2018 shortly after the “Velvet Revolution” that brought Pashinyan to power. He served as deputy finance minister in Armenia’s previous government.  He promised a tougher government crackdown on companies and individuals evading taxes when he took over the SRC. Pashinyan regularly emphasized that the government’s tax revenues have risen significantly since then.