“I respect every citizen’s decision. And in this case, even more so; I respect the first president’s decisions,” Hovik Abrahamyan, the Speaker of the National Assembly of the Republic of Armenia, said yesterday in response to Aravot’s question how he would describe the decision of Levon Ter-Petrossian, the Armenian National Congress (ANC) leader and the first President of the Republic of Armenia, not to participate in the presidential election. We inquired of Mr. Abrahamyan whether the age qualification, which Levon Ter-Petrossian deemed dominant, was the real reason for making such a decision, in his opinion. The Speaker of the National Assembly replied: “Let me not think in his stead.”
By the way, Hovik Abrahamyan, the Speaker of the National Assembly of the Republic of Armenia, took a one-week leave rather unexpectedly from November 14 to 21, which he was going to spend abroad. It was “unexpected” in the sense that the parliament’s four-day session was under way; the National Assembly Speaker didn’t even wait for one day till it was finished. Serzh Sargsyan, the President of the Republic of Armenia, was also on leave at the time. The leave of the National Assembly Speaker also coincided with the statement released by the office of Robert Kocharyan, the second President of the Republic of Armenia. Let us remind that Robert Kocharyan talked about the well-known proposals of the Prosperous Armenia Party – a switch to a parliamentary system of government and 100% proportional representation. In that speech that had multifold overtones, the second president also said: “I would suggest that those ‘wise people,’ who see my shadow everywhere, open their eyes wide, in order that they see at last that a political team, which can draw up the party’s political agenda on its own, is gathered in the Prosperous Armenia Party (PAP).” There were many analyses at the time that Kocharyan had tried to give weight to the PAP by that, that Serzh Sargsyan, reading the statement, quickly summoned Hovik Abrahamyan to his office, and that the National Assembly Speaker had had meetings with Gagik Tsarukyan and Robert Kocharyan abroad. We tried to get Hovik Abrahamyan’s comments on all this yesterday, trying to find out what backstage developments had taken place at that time, after all, and whether this end – the refusal of the PAP, the ANC and the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (ARF) to participate in the presidential election – was their logical consequence. In response to our question, the latter said: “Let me say one thing, and remember it once and for all; my viewpoints will not change, whomever I meet with. It doesn’t matter whether I meet with Kocharyan or Tsarukyan in the air, on the ground or in the water, none of my approaches, my principles or my positions changes. As far as I am concerned, everything is clear and plain. I want to say that my absence or not being present never changes my principles, and I prove that with my deeds, actions. And I was absent for personal reasons that week; nothing else happened.”
NELLY GRIGORYAN
