Susanna Petrosyan, Yerevan. Exclusively for Vestnik Kavkaza
Several key events which significantly influence the internal political panorama of the country took place in 2014.
The participation of the parliamentary opposition in all the important processes encouraged confirmation of the new reality – the National Assembly has completely turned into a political body. The parliament is not an affix of the executive power, which has been adopting the “right” laws during 15 years, anymore. For the first time since 1995, the NA has become an independent political body which is more independent from the President, even though he controls the parliamentary majority.
Another important event was a new balance of forces in the NA. It is the first time in modern Armenian history that about 40% of the seats are controlled by parties which don’t belong to those in power. Today the parliamentary opposition trio (Prosperous Armenia, the Armenian National Congress, and Heritage) and Dashnaktsutyun and the Country of Law have 57-58 of the 131 seats in the parliament.
The third significant event was a decision by the Constitutional Court on April 2nd on the opposition’s request demanding that the Law on Funded Pensions be recognized as anti-Constitutional. For the first time, the Constitutional Court made a decision not in favor of the authorities. The verdict was based on the legal norm which excludes the restriction of citizens’ rights, including the right to property. Moreover, the Court demanded reconsideration of the law. The verdict led to the resignation of Tigran Sarkisyan’s government, even though the authorities hid the real reason for the resignation.
The fourth important factor of the internal political life of last year was the improvement of the opposition’s role. The opposition began to form a political agenda; and the package of 12 demands presented on June 10th confirmed this. The demands touched on the elimination of economic monopolies, the tax and customs spheres, using measures on minimization of socio-economic problems. However, the authorities have traditionally ignored offers from their political opponents. Meanwhile, even the implementation of some of these twelve demands could become a start on the way out of the deep socio-economic crisis in which Armenia exists. The hardcore position of the authorities has strengthened confrontation with society, as the majority of it supports the demands of the trio. As a result, several meetings were organized by the opposition in autumn in all key cities of Armenia. The main demand was the resignation of the authorities.
In the end, those in power have got an opposition which has political initiative and determines the political agenda. It is a sign of the authorities' weakening.
Due to the powerful wave of protest, President Serzh Sargsyan had to cancel discussions of constitutional changes which were planned for the autumn and shift the issue to February 2015. Another sign of the authorities' weakening was the opposition’s rejection of the President’s late offer (on November 10th) to discuss the 12 demands.
The President invited his political opponents to discuss the issue after the government gave a negative answer to the opposition’s demands. The government stated that it was working on the clauses.
The Vice-President of the ANC, Levon Zurabyan, stated that the trio had dropped the subject of the 12 clauses. This was unexpected for the authorities, who accused the trio of marginality, even though it gathered demonstrations of several thousand people.
Finally, the crisis which hit the financial market of Armenia was an important event at the end of 2014, which influenced the political system. The long-lasting policy on artificially strengthening the dram by the government and encouragement of imports at the expense of development of exports back-fired on the authorities, including MPs and officials involved in business affairs. Probably the recent developments in the financial-economic sphere could encourage confrontation inside the government forces.
