Whatever dictator Lukashenka is, it is only too pleasant that Belarus and Armenia have good, friendly relations. That a church has been opened in the town of Abovyan is also agreeable. It is also positive that the three presidents of Armenia were invited to that event. The positive things run out here, because I can predict by 99 percent that this invitation will be accepted by two.
In that same Belarus, that problem does not exist, because there have been no president, except Lukashenka, in that country (Stanislav Shushkevich was the Chairman of the Supreme Council) and will hardly be in the upcoming years. The whole history of Belarus since 1994 has been focused on one person’s face. “Instead,” many of our compatriots will say, “the people of Belarus love their president.” Certainly, they do. Turkmenbashi was also loved, Kim Jong-il too, as for Stalin, they were crazy about him. I would prefer our option when residents of Armenia don’t love their presidents at least during their presidencies. Love for the leader, worship of him, testifies to nothing good either.
These three figures don’t have to like each other at all. But they have to maintain restrained and correct relations with each other, even if they are representatives of different political currents, state about their disagreements in a civilized way. I suppose Barak Obama, for example, doesn’t adore George Bush Senior and Junior, but when they and other former presidents smile to each other and appear in pictures together, they think not about their personal emotions, but the reputation of the presidency, and, hence, that of the state.
Unfortunately, we haven’t reached that desirable situation. The second president first established the bad tradition as far back as in February 1998, since his propagators started to attack the “former criminal regime,” trying to increase Robert Kocharyan’s popularity at the expense of the “predecessors.” That tradition is partly maintained today when they try to belittle Ter-Petrossian’s role in the Artsakh Liberation War, which is – I can find no other word – awful. The first president himself continued that bad tradition, coming back to politics in 2007 and starting to criticize the government using the same language that was used to criticize him in the 1990s. Then all three ask why the state is not the way we would like it to be. Who should set an example?
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In 2014, the Aravot Daily will be 20 years old. I will invite all three presidents. Perhaps they will come.
Aram Abrahamyan
