Azatutyun.am. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian’s Civil Contract party has won a repeat election held in Armenia’s southern Ararat province amid accusations of foul play voiced by opposition figures, election observers and some media outlets.
Voters in a community comprising the provincial town of Vedi and surrounding villages went to the polls on Sunday for the second time in three months to elect a new local council empowered to appoint the community’s chief executive.
The first election held there in December produced inconclusive results. A local opposition bloc called My Strong Community won the largest number of votes but fell short of an overall majority in the council. The two other election contenders, including Civil Contract, failed to cut a power-sharing deal, forcing the conduct of the repeat vote.
Official results showed Civil Contract winning 56 percent of the vote this time around, enough to install its top candidate, Garik Sargsian, as head of the community. My Strong Community got 41 percent. The opposition bloc did not immediately concede defeat or announce plans to challenge the vote results in court.
Read also
In January, the Armenian government appointed Sargsian as interim community mayor in a clear effort to boost the ruling party’s electoral chances. Opposition figures have since repeatedly accused him of abusing his administrative levers to gain an unfair advantage over his opposition challengers.
Daniel Ioannisian, a Yerevan-based civic activist who coordinated a team of local election observers, added his voice to the accusations on Monday. Ioannisian singled out Sargsian’s decision to provide financial aid to low-income local residents in the run-up to the ballot. That, he said, amounted to vote buying.
Minister for Territorial Administration Gnel Sanosian dismissed such claims. Sanosian, who is a senior member of Pashinian’s party, insisted that the Vedi election was free and fair.
The election was also marred by a violent incident that occurred outside a polling station in a village near Vedi. A local opposition activist was reportedly assaulted by two dozen Pashinian supporters.
Ioannisian claimed that police officers guarding the polling station witnessed the beating but did not intervene to stop it. He called for an internal police inquiry into their inaction.
A spokesman for the Armenian police told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service that no such inquiry has been launched so far.
For its part, the Office of the Prosecutor-General said law-enforcement authorities are investigating this incident. It said they are also looking into several reports about multiple voting and unauthorized presence of people in some polling stations.
