Political scientist Armen Badalyan described the upcoming presidential election today as drawing within the framework of government procurement. Let us remind that the political scientist had said that the Republican Party of Armenia (RPA) would give lists to village headmen and demand that they draw the voters’ participation and votes cast for the second candidate for president.
Manvel Badeyan, an RPA MP, stated that the political scientist’s notion of the election as drawing is a scenario devised by strong imagination. “Equating the people’s participation in the election to zero is an insult to people, there is no such thing, nor is it planned and can be planned, even if one wants it very much,” Mr. Badeyan told www.aravot.am.
He is convinced that there won’t be serious rivalry in the election, because the RPA candidate doesn’t have a serious rival.
Talking about political scientist Badalyan’s claims that before the start of the election, we already had a president who had defeated an expert in epic poems, Mr. Badeyan said: “I don’t understand what you are saying. Perhaps some fool said something; I will not comment on that. What shall we do? Should the president think how to appoint a stronger candidate opposing him who is not an expert in epic poems, can you imagine something like that?”
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Then he said that candidates like the expert in epic poems a part of which had withdrawn their candidacies didn’t aim at becoming president. “They aim at showing themselves; perhaps, they want to brag to their mothers-in-law. They don’t have anything to do with the political process; they are comedians.”
Mr. Badeyan also talked about the political scientist’s claims that 26 Baghramyan had already chosen the second candidate for president. “What is 26 Baghramyan? In my opinion, it doesn’t matter who will be the second, because the second, as well as the third and the fourth, is nothing. There is only one president. There is no point in rigging the election, taking illegal actions; it is pointless, because the candidate obviously has a big advantage.”
Mr. Badeyan also blamed the opposition for the noncompetitive election. “If the opposition is not organized; it is its problem. They should have been more organized, should have enjoyed more support of society, and in that case, the election might have been more intense and intriguing. If it is not such now, only the opposition as an immature, disorganized, unstable mass, which hasn’t offered an ideology to society, is to blame for that.”
Arpine SIMONYAN
