Hayots Ashkharh Daily, Armenia
Oct 19 2007

THESE ELECTIONS TO BE EASIER FOR THE VOTER

In response to our questions, Head of Armenian Sociological
Association Gevorg Poghosyan comments on the results of October 2 – 7
poll.

`Your recent survey coincided with the livening of Armenian Pan
National Movement. Does the 3,8% that Levon Ter-Petrosyan obtained,
prove that society is, mildly speaking, far not enthusiastic about
the attack of the former ones?’
‘By the way it was conditioned by the livening of Armenian Pan
National Movement that we decided to conduct the survey at that very
period of time. It is very important for us to know, how can the
appearance of the new player in the political arena change the social
opinion. It came clear that nothing has changed. It seemed Levon
Ter-Petrosyan’s livening created certain enthusiasm – the political
arena became tensed, all the Mass Media started to discuss this fact,
but society, in essence, remained quite indifferent to it.
A question arises – why? Because our society is divided into
layers, not only from the social point of view but also political
activeness. We have 5-7% narrow layer of rich people, more or less
well to do ones, poor people, and those who are beyond poverty line.
This differentiation is strongly emphasized in Armenia. The same is
in politics.
Layers exist here as well. There is a small class here, in the
person of authorities, parties, leaders and Mass Media, who are in
full swing, very much interested in political processes, they are
provided with corresponding information, they know lots of things,
they can see and analyze lots of things and finally exchange
information.
Conventionally, it is a class of rich people in political and
informational terms, with a huge layer of poor people near them (in
informational terms), those who are quite indifferent to everything.
It’s one thing that you are in the middle of the events and it’s
quite a different thing that you are sitting somewhere in the village
and you suddenly hear that Levon Ter-Petrosyan has delivered a speech
somewhere and has made certain announcements. And by the way the
thing is not only about Levon Ter-Petrosyan.’
‘Can the situation essentially change before the elections? Can a
sudden storm change the logic of the pre-election developments?’
‘It can. I must repeat we have measured the starting opportunities
of the political powers. But in any case, the opposition has
resources that they haven’t used by now. It is their unification –
something that we have been hearing for a long time, but we haven’t
seen yet. It is the choice of the leader of the `only candidate’,
who, why not, can definitely influence the election process. If there
is polarization in opposition camp we can expect serious rivalry and
interesting developments during the presidential elections.’
` It is noteworthy that the rating of the leaders essentially
exceeds the rating of their parties, not only in case of `National
Unity’, `Orinats Yerkir’, `Heritage’ but even the Republican
parties.’
‘It is not a new phenomenon. If we refer to Dashnaktsutyun party,
in their case the party gives more to the leader than the leader to
the party. In other cases the contrary logic prevails. For example if
Artashes Geghamyan leaves `National Unity’ the party won’t exist any
more.
As for the Republican Party, it is not a secret that the party’s
rating is mainly conditioned by the organized and coordinated
activity of the Prime Minister and his political team.’
`If we take into considerations the fact that in case of ARFD
party’s rating is much higher than that of the leader, do you think
the fact that Dashnaktsutyun has made a decision to nominate its own
candidate for presidency will work?’
‘Dashnaktsutyun can really face problems in this respect.
Especially because by standing for the elections with their own
candidate Dashnaktsutyun can deprive itself of the authority’s
support and partially lose their rating. Not only because they have
adopted an independent policy. The authority stands for the elections
in the person of coalition and Dashnaktsutyun as if stands aside.
The worst example is `Orinats Yerkir’ party, that was driven out
of the coalition and was not accepted by the opposition, as a result,
they lost a big part of their supporters. By refusing to join the
coalition Dashnaktsutyun can also be deprived of certain levers, with
all the circumstances deriving from it. On the other hand it is
worthy of respect, that knowing that they will lose something,
Dashnaktsutyun anyway made a decision to conduct an independent
policy.
Anyhow this time it will be easier for the voter, because they
have to choose not between 20 parties but 6-7 specific individuals.
And the most important thing is that people know all the candidates
and are familiar with their biography.

LILIT POGHOSYAN