Murad Grigoryan, a member of the Armenian National Congress (ANC), criticizes Raffi Hovhannisyan for not having a program and secretly negotiating with Serzh Sargsyan.
Talking about President Serzh Sargsyan’s meeting with the mass media during a conversation with www.aravot.am, Murad Grigoryan, an ANC coordinator, criticized both Serzh Sargsyan and Raffi Hovhannisyan. “I describe Serzh Sargsyan’s press conference as a poorly organized and poorly staged monologue, a monologue, the background of which was the journalists who had been invited and were sitting. I think that it was high time, and Serzh Sargsyan skillfully seized the opportunity, to put it mildly, to expose Raffi Hovhannisyan and actually, to besmirch him. Raffi, along with his advisers, had ‘cleverly’ gone to 26 Baghramyan 10-20 days before and hadn’t presented anything to the public, to his supporters. I think there was a secret agreement between them, and it was there as early as when candidates were announced, according to the instruction-demand for Raffi, along with his two colleagues, Hrant and Paruyr, to appear on the ballot and create an imitation of rivalry. Serzh Sargsyan would talk his head off about that abroad. In accordance with the agreements of that time, from the beginning of the election campaign when state information agencies sponsored by Mishik – even before the election campaign – would present Raffi as a candidate who would come second. And basically it was the argument that made the people disgusted with the government, angry, and mutinous try to turn second into first just to get rid of this gang,” Murad Grigoryan thinks. According to our interlocutor, Serzh Sargsyan used that mutual agreement at the right moment, appearing in an advantageous position. “There was a secret agreement, and now I assume that Serzh Sargsyan has become convinced after he has been summoned, not visited, every other day that the imitation of political rivalry hasn’t made the desired impression, in order that it could be used as a resource either in Moscow or in Brussels, and he seized the moment. While Raffi was silent, he made revelations first. The respondent usually justifies himself, moans, and partially denies. Serzh Sargsyan has found himself in a more favorable position in terms of propaganda, anyway,” the ANC coordinator
continued. According to him, on the night of the day when Serzh Sargsyan hinted at using the law-enforcement bodies, explaining it with maintaining the constitutional order, Raffi’s parents appeared in Yerevan, in Freedom Square. “Taking into account the whole resource of the candidate, I think Raffi Hovhannisyan talks nonsense, makes unclear statements, because he doesn’t have a program. Now I think that papa and mama have come to take their child by the hand and take their kid home for good. I mean the US. The past experience has shown that this guy cannot succeed; he has been persisting, putting all his effort for 20 years, and he cannot succeed,” our interlocutor concluded.
Nune AREVSHATYAN
