EDITORIAL
13 OCTOBER 2018
Elections to the National Assembly, fraught with a new parliamentary crisis
What are parliamentary elections for and what does a proportional system of governance imply?
This means that in Armenia the power belongs to the parties representing the paths of development, and the society either gives its approval or not. The one who receives the greatest amount of “YES” rules the country for the next 5 years, while the rest criticize. At least, this is the meaning of elections, elections in the National Assembly are considered indicators of the processes taking place in society.
Now, considering this simple scheme, let's try to understand the situation in Armenia.
The former used power and used the resources of the country for their narrow group interests. Once Serzh Sargsyan very aptly called the ruling group a bunch. This was the content and meaning of banditry. During the four-day April war in 2016, the government lost the last vestiges of legitimacy – it was not even able to provide security. The Armenian army, armed with weapons of the 80s, was an assessment of the effectiveness of the control system. This was the beginning of the end. The end came in April of this year.
Since 1991, the Armenian society had one main dream – the change of power. This dream came true, but the solution to the problems facing society and the country remained uncertain. Recall that, in accordance with the Armenian model of governance, parties must propose solutions, and the right to choose between them belongs to the people.
Parliamentary elections will be held in the coming months. The most important problem is what the newly elected deputies will discuss in the new parliament, in the “place for talking”, in order to interest the public?
In Armenia, power belongs to the parties, and there is no elected president who will guarantee stability in emergency situations. However, the party field collapsed. This implies a serious political and state crisis. There are no parties that inspire confidence, there are no future projects.
The cycle closed on one person around whom different people gathered for different purposes. The “Civil contract” will follow the path of the ANM and the RPA because it was built on the axis of power and for the sake of power. Under the conditions of a political crisis, we will not choose a program of political development, but we will choose a person who did not offer his project to the public, and, naturally, the people gathered around him did not come together for the sake of a non-existent idea and a non-existent program. It will be a choice with closed eyes, that is, we will choose in the absence of a choice: many for Hope, few for more tangible reasons.
Parliamentarism is a system of state administration, where power is separated from the legislative and executive powers, where the current prime minister forms the list at his discretion, and no one doubts that this list will constitute an absolute majority in parliament. This is contrary to the spirit of parliamentarism, and the primacy will belong not to the legislature, but to the executive.
The intrigue of the situation lies in the fact that if parties with public confidence are formed, we will again have a parliamentary crisis, since the real parties will remain outside parliament, and the administrative nomenclature will be presented inside. In fact, the main political processes will resume on the street, which may again lead to a “change of the situation” and a new parliamentary crisis.