“Yes, he is polite, possesses a high intellect, has deep knowledge in a lot of fields, is honest, but…” This is how the majority of evaluations of presidential candidate Armen Sargsyan start with. The most interesting, nonetheless, starts after “but”. But does he know the Armenian reality, does he understand where he is, will he be able to contradict to our beasts? Will he be able to change anything, eventually?
Firstly – about changing. In Armenia there is a widespread misleading idea that someone can come and change the life of each of us, make it rich and happy. However, such “wizards” do not exist. I was given the same senseless question (“will he be able to do anything?”) also a year and a half ago, when Karen Karapetyan was elected as the PM. I do not think that his government has not done anything good: of course, it could have done more. But when someone asks whether he will do anything or not, he means any fantastic and surreal alteration of the life, implying whether s/he will live approximately as Samvel Aleksanyan or Gagik Tsarukyan, inasmuch as “it is fair”, and the rest… well the rest know what to. No PM can make such magic.
And when they ask about Armen Sargsyan also whether he understands where he is, perhaps they subconsciously mean the alternative existing in this reality: either you play by the unwritten rules of the Armenian “elite” and become “one of them”, or refuse playing by those rules and in that case the danger of becoming marginal or at least isolating is high. Assuredly, the mentioned alternative has a very beautiful answer: “we should pursue solely one rule – the Constitution”. But it is simply a theoretical overview: in Armenia (and, I think not only in Armenia) a minister’s driver can sometimes “solve more issues” than a minister him or herself. The circle of liabilities is underlined not only by the official description of the work, but also the existing ratio of powers.
Consequently, Armen Sargsyan stands before a difficult issue – to acquire such circle of liabilities as to be able to implement his good intentions the existence of which, it seems, no one doubts. And assuredly to implement that issue one needs to have proper information. Perhaps the meetings of the presidential candidate are aimed at that?
Aram ABRAHAMYAN
