NIKOL PASHINYAN IS DISTORTING THE FACTS, SAYS HERITAGE PARTY
epress.am
03.26.2012
Heritage Party spokesperson Hovsep Khurshudyan, responding to
Armenian National Congress (HAK) representative and candidate in
the no. 7 electoral district for the upcoming parliamentary election
Nikol Pashinyan’s statement earlier today, said that the latter is
distorting the facts.
Recall, according to Pashinyan, the Heritage Party offered to withdraw
its leader Raffi Hovannisian’s candidacy from the no. 7 electoral
district if HAK withdrew its candidates from the no. 1, 4, 6, 9 and
12 electoral districts. This is so that opposition candidates would
not be up against each other in the same constituency.
“Our offer was to back HAK candidates in 21 constituencies; Heritage
Party candidates in 7; while in the remaining 13, we would back
the Armenian Revolutionary Federation [Dashnaktsutyun, the other
parliamentary opposition party] candidates.
“That is, HAK wanted us to leave only 2-3 candidates in the
single-mandate constituencies so that our offer would be considered
logical?” Khurshudyan asked.
Epress.am asked MP Armen Martirosyan, as the Heritage Party
representative holding talks with HAK, to comment on Pashinyan’s
statement that ahead of the registration of candidates, HAK suggested
that the Heritage Party present its list of preferred electoral
districts, but the latter suggesting moving the matter to election
period, when candidates are already nominated.
Martirosyan said it was the Heritage Party, in fact, that began
negotiations. According to him, HAK responded a few days late, when
it was already time to nominate candidates and the Heritage Party was
busy compiling its list of candidates under the system of proportional
representation and there was no more time.
“Until Raffi Hovannisian was nominated for the no. 7 district,
there was no such hysteria, which smelled like blackmail. This isn’t
2009, the Heritage Party shouldn’t be spoken to using such blackmail
language,” he said.
Epress.am asked Nikol Pashinyan for comments following these latest
statements, to which the opposition candidate said that he won’t be
making any further comments concerning the Heritage Party and what
he had to say he said at the press conference earlier today.