ARMENIA: DEMANDS FOR VOTER PASSPORTS SPARK ELECTION CONTROVERSY
by Gayane Abrahamyan
Eurasianet, NY
April 4, 2007
Reports of pro-government political parties allegedly seizing voter
passports has become one of the most controversial issues surrounding
the conduct of Armenia’s May 12 parliamentary elections. While both
the ruling Republican Party of Armenia and the influential Prosperous
Armenia Party have denied any involvement, opposition parties charge
that the practice could seriously affect the outcome of the vote.
Rosa Sanasarian, a 72-year-old resident of Yerevan’s central Avan
neighborhood, told EurasiaNet that she was forced to hand over her
passport data to district officials to receive a two-month social
welfare payment. The officials stated that they needed the information
to register Sanasarian for the funds.
"People from the district administration told me to vote for the
Republican Party, otherwise they threatened to take away my "paros"
said Sanasarian, in reference to her bi-monthly allowance.
Not all voters, however, object to handing over their passports. In
Charbakh, a suburb of Yerevan, Gurgen Mkrtumian, a 62-year-old
construction worker, said that he handed over to Prosperous Armenia
Party members the passports for all five of the voters in his family
in exchange for 25,000 drams (about $70).
"The party that’s been chosen to win will be elected no matter whether
I vote or not," Mkrtumian explained. "I will at least get the money I
need very much." Mkrtumian said that he intends to stand by his pledge
to vote for Prosperous Armenia in return for the cash. "I have taken
the money and I have given my word as a man," he said.
Members of Armenia’s opposition claim that Prosperous Armenia, named
the frontrunner in many opinion polls, and the ruling Republican Party
of Armenia (RPA) are using the passport scoops to avoid detection of
more overt forms of vote manipulation on election day by international
observers, who are expected to scrutinize this vote more heavily
than usual.
"People are told ‘Look, we take your passport or your passport data
and we will later check whom you have voted for. We have given you a
bribe, so you vote for our candidate,’" charged Grigor Harutyunian,
a member of the political council of the People’s Party of Armenia,
one of the main opposition parties in parliament. "’We will know if
you don’t and it won’t be good for you,’" he claimed voters are told.
Ruzan Khachatrian, a board member of the People’s Party of Armenia,
claims that the practice is not limited to targeting adults alone.
"The passport data are shamelessly gathered even at schools," she
claimed. "The school principals are mainly members of either Prosperous
Armenia or the Republican Parties and force children to bring in
their parents’ passports, promising high grades in return for them."
Both the Republican Party and Prosperous Armenia Party have strongly
denied that they are involved in collecting passports or paying voters
for the information.
In a March 15 meeting with journalists, Parliamentary Speaker Tigran
Torosian, who holds the number two spot on the Republican Party’s list
of candidates, affirmed that the party "has not instructed anyone to
collect passports or [to take] any such kind of steps."
Torosian, however, stopped short of giving guarantees that election law
violations would not occur during the campaign. "The RPA has several
tens of thousands of members. Who can claim to be able to supervise
the activities of these several tens of thousands of members? Nobody,
I think," Torosian said.
On March 7, Deputy Parliamentary Speaker Vahan Hovhannisian, a member
of the ruling council of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation, a
member of Armenia’s ruling coalition, called on voters not to give
out their passports and passport numbers, warning that the practice
was a crime.
Meanwhile, economist Vardan Bostanjian, a member of Prosperous
Armenia’s political council and a party list candidate, maintains
that Prosperous Armenia has no need to use "artificial" means to win
votes. "The party has 370,000 members and these people have joined it
because of affection [for the party] and because of their beliefs,"
Bostanjian told reporters on March 22.
Passport grabs are not the only controversy to have marked the
parliamentary campaign, however. Considerable debate has dogged the
activities of a charitable organization connected with Prosperous
Armenia leader Gagik Tsarukian. Wheat and potato seeds have been
distributed to farmers for sowing, free medical care provided in
the regions, and buses provided to transport university students
into Yerevan free of charge. [For details, see the Eurasia Insight
archive]. The Republican Party and opposition People’s Party have
also reportedly undertaken various charitable activities.
Armenia’s election code does not provide clear guidance on how to
qualify such handouts. The code prohibits charitable acts by political
parties only during the official election campaign period.
The campaign for the May parliamentary vote starts on April 8 and
lasts until May 10. The code does not specify how the restrictions
apply to the pre-campaign period.
Nor is the problem a new one. Surveys performed by the Regional
Development Center and Transparency International Yerevan indicated
that 75 percent of voters during Armenia’s 2003 parliamentary vote
had been offered financial incentives to favor a certain party or
candidate.
NOTES: Gayane Abrahamyan is a reporter for the ArmeniaNow online
weekly.