As it is already clear that the next president of Armenia will be Vahagn Khachatryan, I want to address the issue both from a personal and political point of view. From a personal point of view, he is a very worthy candidate. What is being said now about Vahagn Khachatryan’s alleged “abuses” as the mayor of Yerevan does not inspire any faith and is not subject to any logical examination. The image that the opposition or those who don’t wish well upon Khachatryan are trying to create or is in stark contrast to his real value system. I would like to single out restraint from the many human virtues of the candidate. During the administrations of Robert Kocharyan and Serzh Sargsyan, he was part of the opposition, but neither in public nor in private conversations did he allow himself to use the vocabulary typical of former and current members of the opposition. This is very important to me because, in my opinion, the tone of the debate is more important than its content.
However, if we analyze the political context of Khachatryan’s appointment, I do not have any positive expectations here. (I use the word “appoint” because the current president will be the chairman of the “Civil Contract”; in the end, he will be elected only by the members of that faction). First of all, I have already written many times that very little depends on the President under the current Constitution, and that “very little” will be zero in the current circumstances. So, the president himself does not decide anything today.
In addition, a possible presidential candidate is currently working as a minister. This means that he is a member of Pashinyan’s political team. (Armen Sarkissian, at least formally, was not a member of the RPA). Therefore, Khachatryan considers that the former authorities are “robbers” and “guilty of defeat.” I do not imagine how it is possible to work as a minister for Pashinyan and not share that main “ideological thesis” of the ruling power.
According to that, the Armenian people have been wandering in darkness for centuries, and only in 2018 did the sun rise in the form of Pashinyan. But in my opinion, the President of the Republic should be so high that he can cooperate with all political forces, including the two opposition factions in the National Assembly. How is it possible to cooperate with the “robbers” and “those who handed over Artsakh in advance”?
Read also
In the last parliamentary elections, 54% of the electorate voted for the Civil Contract, 26% for the two opposition forces, and the remaining 20% for the others. Half of the voters did not come to the polls at all, and we do not know what they think. The government, of course, should have been formed from the “Civil Contract,” there is simply no other option. But the president, as far as I understand, must represent the interests of all citizens, and moreover, all Armenians.
Aram Abrahamyan
