POOR ELECTORATE
Naira Hayrumyan
Story from Lragir.am News:
Published: 12:40:37 – 16/02/2012
Poverty is becoming the most important political factor in Armenia. As
the chairman of the Armenian Pan-National Movement Aram Manukyan noted,
with the present level of poverty in Armenia, the election is turned
into trade in votes.
Nobody argues that election bribe is the key method used in the
campaign for the mayoral election in Hrazdan and will be soon applied
in the parliamentary elections. Anyway, during the parliamentary
hearing yesterday nobody questioned the statements of the ARFD and
the Armenian National Congress representatives that election bribes
were distributed to voters in Hrazdan.
It is possible, of course, to consider this issue from several angles,
saying that poor people sell their votes to those who pay more, we
can state people have no civil conscience and are not aware of the
power of their vote.
But the important thing here is to understand the level of poverty of
the society, and see how many people live beyond the poverty threshold,
when they manage to maintain their families with AMD 5 thousand. So
many people in Armenia are in debt, jobless, relying on luck to find
money for their daily bread. Who is to blame? What has the government
done to reduce the number of these people?
According to the UN, these people are over 30% of the population of
Armenia. In other words, one third of the population does not feel the
existence of the government, does not receive any kind of assistance.
On the contrary, confronts with it all the time. The level of poverty
has increased recently and the government of Armenia is responsible
for that.
The government is to blame for every step it took were aimed, as
it stated itself, at the solution of macroeconomic issues. At the
same time, the government does not hide that the society will not
taste the fruits of its steps right now. So what was the purpose of
these steps if it was not the improvement of the quality of life of
people? Was the purpose to enrich the notorious 1%?
The government which admits the existence of such a huge number of
poor people in the country but does nothing to reduce poverty does it
on purpose to have at least one third of the electorate ready to sell
their votes. If the government took up steps to improve the quality
of life, a middle class would be formed in Armenia which would acquire
civil consciousness and would ask questions to the government.
The Prime Minister does not hide that it does not do anything to
prevent emigration of people who need work. He joked once that these
people are potential revolutionaries who had better be removed in
time. As a result, the “potential revolutionaries” are sent abroad, and
those who stay are maintained at such a level of poverty for them to
die from hunger and be ready to sell everything for 5 thousand drams.
If a person condemns another person to starvation, he will be
immediately sued as a criminal. But, when the government condemns 30%
of the population to starvation, it is considered economic policy in
crisis “which makes mistakes”.
But the worst thing is that this government is trying to prove the
rightness of its policy and to hold on to power and it succeeds because
it has done its main job in 5 years – it has formed a poor electorate.