“I cannot quite understand how a person on the right side of 60 can express absolutely different opinions a few times a day,” Ruben Mehrabyan, an expert of the Center for Political and International Studies, said in response to a question of www.aravot.am what the logic of P. Hayrikyan’s moves was. According to the political scientist, the time will come and Hayrikyan will give that answer. R. Mehrabyan thinks that Hayrikyan’s moves don’t have a political explanation. Mr. Mehrabyan wished to “have a clear conscience” and didn’t comment on the news that these moves of Hayrikyan were made to grab an office.
In recent days, the fact that President Serzh Sargsyan had visited P. Hayrikyan twice has been exploited too. Mr. Mehrabyan said in this regard: “I am sure that besides inquiring about his health, they also discussed his future steps during these meetings.”
Armen Badalyan, an expert in political and electoral technologies, thinks that S. Sargsyan explained certain things and warned Hayrikyan during the meetings in the hospital and goes into detail: “The incumbent president might explain that Hayrikyan shouldn’t try to play an active role in the theatrical act under way and try to attach importance to his filing or not filing a petition in the Constitutional Court. Hayrikyan doesn’t carry political weight to try to grab something, since the president has a lot more resources to turn this whole joke to Hayrikyan’s disadvantage. No one can guarantee that the arrested drug addicts will not say during an interrogation that it was arranged by Hayrikyan. In all probability, the incumbent president explained to Hayrikyan that he shouldn’t cherish any hopes to gain dividends from this process. He will not gain anything anyway.”
A. Badalyan describes Hayrikyan’s moves as an attempt “to grab journalists’ attention.” As for getting an office, he states: “If the incumbent president wants to give an office to him, he will do it without any incident. If he doesn’t want, he will not do it. At the end of the day, one should understand that it didn’t matter whether Hayrikyan would or wouldn’t file a petition in the Constitutional Court, since the Constitutional Court is not an independent legal system. It is an office attached to the Presidential Palace that carries out certain projects. Whether the election would be postponed or not was to be decided in the Presidential Palace too. Only equal parties bargain. And if one party is the president, and it doesn’t matter what percentage of votes the other party will win, there is no bargaining between such forces, and there is no buying or selling of offices between such forces.” In conclusion, A. Badalyan
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stated that the forces that wished to turn the election into a joke have managed to do that, and it is already clear that the incumbent president is not legitimate.
Tatev HARUTYUNYAN
