Nikole Pashinyan’s “Impeachment project” is not so much a project about dismissal of the president as a message, whose recipient is the Parliamentary Trio. As with any step, which is done to someone “from malice” (“well, now, I will tear off your face and will show who the real opposition is and will do a natural lustration”), such a move raises some questions. Particularly, who said that being an opposition necessarily means to fight for extraordinary elections, and if it turns out that you are demanding an immediate regime change, then you are not a true opposition.
Isn’t it possible to have opposing views, disagree with external, internal and first of all economic policy of the government authorities, and fight for your party to win the next elections? Those who give a negative answer to this question are usually bringing two arguments: a/ the country is wrecking, b/ extraordinary elections are held fairer than the regular ones.
I have many times written about the first argument, as for the second one, I immediately recall the 1998 presidential elections, which, in my opinion, were the fairest in the history of the Third Republic, because people encouraged by nostalgic memories univocally elected Karen Demirchyan. Let me remind you that in the meantime the “popular forces” had carried out a palace coup, and the very forces organized the elections as it was beneficial to them. Similarly, all kinds of elections can proceed: regular or extraordinary, parliamentary or presidential. The extraordinary nature of the elections, thus, does not guarantee the fairness of them. While, the “extraordinary” cause a particular strain in inner life, which in our situation is not so much desirable.
Now, I think, it is the right time to be prepared for the 2017 regular parliamentary elections, and in this regard, the idea of establishing opposition headquarters in every neighborhood can be effective. I imagine their work not so much political (“elect us”), rather than as a civil campaign. “Your well-being depends on your standing for your vote and voice. Good kings and heroes would not come. Ordinary with numerous-sins people would come, but the people who are dependent on you and whom you will be able to change by your willingness.” I do not know whether two years are enough for instilling this consciousness in people, but I know that no fair elections would occur without this consciousness. Nor, there would be a normal country.
ARAM ABRAHAMYAN
