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In memory of 1 March, Armenia faces post-electoral homework
On the side of the authorities, there should now be thorough
investigations into who violated the electoral code and with that
produced a burdenfor their own candidate, SerzhSargsyan.
On 1 March, five years after the tragedy of post-electoral unrests in
Yerevan with 10 casualties, it is worth noting that Armenia today is
no longer comparable to Armenia in 2008. Today, all political forces
are represented in the parliament, there is freedom of assembly,
freedom of the media, the electoral law has been improved following
the recommendations of the Council of Europe's Venice Commission, the
technical organisation of the elections has improved, and most
importantly, there is no violence on the streets.
March 2, 2013
PanARMENIAN.Net - All of these developments are vital for Armenia's
relations with Europe, and the European Commission, which last year
included Armenia in the small group of countries benefitting from the
`more aid for more reforms' principle, now seeks to conclude a Deep
and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreement before the Eastern Partnership
Summit in Vilnius this coming November. The trouble of the
presidential elections of 18 February is that some problems of
manipulation still persisted and that the oppositional part of the
society now believes that these remaining problems have changed the
outcome of the elections, challenging the 58.6% official first round
victory of the incumbent President SerzhSargsyan.
In all democratic countries, some of these `cases of...', as the
observers reported, can still be found. The key question is not so
much WHAT they find, but the scale. The international observer
missions denied that the outcome of the elections was changed. For
this, more than 125.000 votes would have had to be changed and while
the change of even just a few thousand votes is a scandal, none of the
highly qualified observer missions was able to detect a massive
organised manipulation on the scale of 125.000 votes. From the
perspective of a critical or oppositional citizen, however, you will
remember many manipulated elections in Armenia, and you will naturally
be alarmed and in disbelieve to hear about hundreds of cases of
violating Armenia's electoral laws also this time. You will also find
it difficult to believe the international observers in that the
documented misuse of administrative resources and the cases of voter
intimidation were not significant enough to change the outcome of the
elections. Using these sentiments, Raffi Hovhannisyan on 19 February
claimed to have received 80%, meaning 635.000 more votes than his
official result. To be fair, the Armenian authorities would possess
supernatural powers if they managed to organise a manipulation (before
and on Election Day) of nearly every second vote in the country while
hiding all this from hundreds of experienced European observers.
Besides, the latest TNS poll before the election, the one with the
strongest foreign supervision, quality control and transparency, was
not influenced by any cases of vote-buying, voter intimidation, ballot
stuffing or miscounting, but the results were very similar to the
official election results.
What now?
I believe Raffi Hovhannisyan when he says that he does not want to see
any violence or revolution. His style of campaigning was also healthy
for Armenia's democracy and his on-going post-electoral tour is
another sign of this style, which reaches out to the society. It is
good and noteworthy that today, people even in the countryside feel
that they can join such public rallies without fear. However, I am
currently a bit lost as to what his strategy is, because he knows
Armenian politics long enough to know that nobody can simply
`convince' the authorities to hand over the presidency, and that the
chances of this happening are close to zero when the results of the
observations and of the elections are as clear as they are. Besides,
his public announcements are so far very vague, like a mobilisation
without a visible goal or path. There is a danger that his current
struggle will among the disappointed part of the society only raise
hope for something which he cannot deliver. Meanwhile, it increases
public distrust and discontent even further, leads to even more
emigration and weakens the country on the inside and outside. From our
meetings I know that this would actually be the opposite of what he
wants for Armenia and of what he believes in. So we will need to see
how things will develop in the coming weeks: maybe all this is just a
normal political stand-off to pressure the government for more reforms
while saving his face and avoiding looking like a loser. By the way, I
think he is absolutely no loser, because he managed to build up a
united oppositional support which most experts would have thought
impossible only three months ago. One realistic strategy would now be
to transform this into a lasting political movement which soon enough
can really win elections. The time between New Year and Election Day
was naturally not enough to build up such a movement.
On the side of the authorities, there should now be thorough
investigations into who violated the electoral code and with that
produced a burdenfor their own candidate, SerzhSargsyan. One
motivation for genuine investigations and prosecutions may be that
they could in some cases find perpetrators who had the political
intention to damage the incumbent. In any case, the President needs to
clean up his own camp to some extent, if he wants that camp to be
strong in the long run. Apart from that, the President declared that
he will now focus on internal economic and institutional reforms and
the more he manages to show successes of these reforms, the more will
he be able to gain respect of not only his own voters but of all
Armenians. With that, the coming five years can make Armenia move
further away from the low-point of 1 March 2008, and the changes can
be so fundamental that they will be irreversible and visible for all.
Secretary General of European Friends of Armenia Dr Michael Kambeck
- See more at: http://www.panarmenian.net/eng/details/148257/#sthash.DJmHirdr.dpuf
On the side of the authorities, there should now be thorough
investigations into who violated the electoral code and with that
produced a burdenfor their own candidate, SerzhSargsyan.
On 1 March, five years after the tragedy of post-electoral unrests in
Yerevan with 10 casualties, it is worth noting that Armenia today is
no longer comparable to Armenia in 2008. Today, all political forces
are represented in the parliament, there is freedom of assembly,
freedom of the media, the electoral law has been improved following
the recommendations of the Council of Europe's Venice Commission, the
technical organisation of the elections has improved, and most
importantly, there is no violence on the streets.
March 2, 2013
PanARMENIAN.Net - All of these developments are vital for Armenia's
relations with Europe, and the European Commission, which last year
included Armenia in the small group of countries benefitting from the
`more aid for more reforms' principle, now seeks to conclude a Deep
and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreement before the Eastern Partnership
Summit in Vilnius this coming November. The trouble of the
presidential elections of 18 February is that some problems of
manipulation still persisted and that the oppositional part of the
society now believes that these remaining problems have changed the
outcome of the elections, challenging the 58.6% official first round
victory of the incumbent President SerzhSargsyan.
In all democratic countries, some of these `cases of...', as the
observers reported, can still be found. The key question is not so
much WHAT they find, but the scale. The international observer
missions denied that the outcome of the elections was changed. For
this, more than 125.000 votes would have had to be changed and while
the change of even just a few thousand votes is a scandal, none of the
highly qualified observer missions was able to detect a massive
organised manipulation on the scale of 125.000 votes. From the
perspective of a critical or oppositional citizen, however, you will
remember many manipulated elections in Armenia, and you will naturally
be alarmed and in disbelieve to hear about hundreds of cases of
violating Armenia's electoral laws also this time. You will also find
it difficult to believe the international observers in that the
documented misuse of administrative resources and the cases of voter
intimidation were not significant enough to change the outcome of the
elections. Using these sentiments, Raffi Hovhannisyan on 19 February
claimed to have received 80%, meaning 635.000 more votes than his
official result. To be fair, the Armenian authorities would possess
supernatural powers if they managed to organise a manipulation (before
and on Election Day) of nearly every second vote in the country while
hiding all this from hundreds of experienced European observers.
Besides, the latest TNS poll before the election, the one with the
strongest foreign supervision, quality control and transparency, was
not influenced by any cases of vote-buying, voter intimidation, ballot
stuffing or miscounting, but the results were very similar to the
official election results.
What now?
I believe Raffi Hovhannisyan when he says that he does not want to see
any violence or revolution. His style of campaigning was also healthy
for Armenia's democracy and his on-going post-electoral tour is
another sign of this style, which reaches out to the society. It is
good and noteworthy that today, people even in the countryside feel
that they can join such public rallies without fear. However, I am
currently a bit lost as to what his strategy is, because he knows
Armenian politics long enough to know that nobody can simply
`convince' the authorities to hand over the presidency, and that the
chances of this happening are close to zero when the results of the
observations and of the elections are as clear as they are. Besides,
his public announcements are so far very vague, like a mobilisation
without a visible goal or path. There is a danger that his current
struggle will among the disappointed part of the society only raise
hope for something which he cannot deliver. Meanwhile, it increases
public distrust and discontent even further, leads to even more
emigration and weakens the country on the inside and outside. From our
meetings I know that this would actually be the opposite of what he
wants for Armenia and of what he believes in. So we will need to see
how things will develop in the coming weeks: maybe all this is just a
normal political stand-off to pressure the government for more reforms
while saving his face and avoiding looking like a loser. By the way, I
think he is absolutely no loser, because he managed to build up a
united oppositional support which most experts would have thought
impossible only three months ago. One realistic strategy would now be
to transform this into a lasting political movement which soon enough
can really win elections. The time between New Year and Election Day
was naturally not enough to build up such a movement.
On the side of the authorities, there should now be thorough
investigations into who violated the electoral code and with that
produced a burdenfor their own candidate, SerzhSargsyan. One
motivation for genuine investigations and prosecutions may be that
they could in some cases find perpetrators who had the political
intention to damage the incumbent. In any case, the President needs to
clean up his own camp to some extent, if he wants that camp to be
strong in the long run. Apart from that, the President declared that
he will now focus on internal economic and institutional reforms and
the more he manages to show successes of these reforms, the more will
he be able to gain respect of not only his own voters but of all
Armenians. With that, the coming five years can make Armenia move
further away from the low-point of 1 March 2008, and the changes can
be so fundamental that they will be irreversible and visible for all.
Secretary General of European Friends of Armenia Dr Michael Kambeck
- See more at: http://www.panarmenian.net/eng/details/148257/#sthash.DJmHirdr.dpuf