On February 12th, in 39 residential areas of Armenia, elections to local administrations took place. The central elections were in the administrative center of the Kotajk region, Razdan, situated 50 km from Yerevan. Candidates for the position of mayor of Razdan were members of the ruling RPA – the current mayor Aram Daneilyan and his advisor Ovanes Prtavyan - and a representative of the opposition ANK, one of the well-known commanders of the Karabkah war, former political prisoner Sysan Mikaelyan.
Electoral participation was high for Armenia. 25,386 (57.86%) residents of Razdan participated in voting. The winner was the current mayor, Aram Daniyelyan, who gained more than 13 thousand votes. His rival, the oppositionist Sysan Mikaelyan, got more than 11.5 thousand votes.
The atmosphere was tense during the elections. Representatives of the election teams of Daniyelyan and Mikaelyan accused each other of violating the law. For example, Mikaelyan’s team stated that multiple violations were taking place during the voting, that supporters of Daniyelyan drove buses with people to electoral districts and gave away bribes of $12.5 to $25. The press service of Daniyelyan spread information that during the elections there was an attempt to vote for Mikaelyan using a fake passport.
After the elections had been finished, the head of Mikaelyan’s election team, Akop Avakumyan, said: “The number of falsifications and bribes during the mayoral elections in Razdan is so big that all these violations cannot be detected by an appeal to court. That is why the election team of Sysan Mikaelyan won’t go against the results of the elections.” Aram Daniyelyan denied this information and called it a slander. According to the mayor, the elections were calm and peaceful with high electoral participation. The vice-chairman of RPA, Galust Saakyan, said: “If we consider the elections without relying on rumors, these elections went well, even though the losing party perceives defeat angrily.” According to the Armenian police, the elections were calm, except for a couple of cases, which are under investigation. The head of the Central Electoral Commission, Tigran Mukuchyan, gave a high appraisal to the elections too. He said that no observers’ rights had been restricted and the electoral commissions didn’t receive any claims of violations by the candidates.
However, the elections in Razdan became the central event of the local elections. Journalists and experts called them primaries, during which major political forces tested their abilities.
RPA effectively used its human, administrative and financial resources during these elections. The opposition was as effective as its rival. Due to clear and organized activity of ANK representatives, planned falsifications were prevented.
If we consider the elections in Razdan as a model of the coming parliamentary elections on May 6th, we can see the unavailability or even helplessness of the opposition in the sphere of administrative and financial resources. Considering the high level of the opposition mobilization, which enabled to prevent falsification of ballots, and the difficult socio-economic situation in society, the main instrument of falsifications in the elections in Razdan were election bribes. “Power always has time for work with such a “critical majority”, while the opposition hasn’t found effective approaches yet and doesn’t know how to reduce “election bribes” to a minimal level,” the political observer of Lragir, Akop Badalyan, thinks.
Nevertheless, considering the lack of administrative resources and limited financial abilities of the opposition, the results of the elections, in which the governmental candidate gained only 1500 voices more than his opponent, cannot be perceived as negative. According to the political observer Armen Badalyan, the ANK achieved great success: “The elections in Razdan demonstrated that people vote for the ANK for ideological reasons rather than financial benefits. The ANK has a stable electorate, and it is a disadvantage of our opposition.”
The main lesson of the elections in Razdan is the ability of the opposition to consolidate around an idea of conducting fair and transparent elections – the candidate of the ANK was supported by the opposition parties Heritage and Free Democrats. Another important aspect is a significant number of “pure voices.”
However, the parliamentary elections differ from local ones in their scale, social resonance and ideology. Probably the opposition, which appeared to be unprepared for election bribes, could use the rest of time ahead of the elections for appropriate work with the electorate.
Susanna Petrosyan, Yerevan. Exclusively to VK
