THREE APPLES FELL FROM THE SKY FOR THE PRIME MINISTER, THE PRESIDENT AND THE SOCIETY
Hakob Badalyan

Lragir, Armenia
10-09-2007 12:00:40

The last poll held by the Gallup Institute was like thunder in the
calm home political sky of Armenia. At the moment when everyone
said unanimously there is no alternative to Serge Sargsyan, and the
opposition is unanimously confirming this point of view, the Gallup
suddenly showed up and pointed to three alternatives at once. In
addition, they are all the same height and all of them taller than
Serge Sargsyan. However, the political sphere did not realize what
the fable taught. They did not even try to understand who taught.

Meanwhile, it could be a highly important circumstance in understanding
the political process. The problem is that the results of the poll by
the Gallup institute suggest the controversy in the government or the
potential for this controversy. It does not matter whether the results
of the poll which give a lower popular rating to Serge Sargsyan than
to Vardan Oskanyan, Raffi Hovannisian or Gagik Tsarukyan are real. For
instance, the leader of the Republican faction Karen Karapetyan said
he has other data from Gallup which give the highest rating to Serge
Sargsyan. The problem is that Karen Karapetyan has not released this
data yet, whereas the other was released, and Gallup did not refute it.

Consequently, everyone who wants to be an actor rather than an
observer in the political process must discern the purpose of the
released poll. Therefore, it is necessary to analyze the possible
targets of this poll. The first could be Serge Sargsyan to whom
they are trying to make clear that he should not think there is no
alternative to him, and he should take into account the opinion of the
"environment". Hence, Karen Karapetyan might have got favorable data
from Gallup but Serge Sargsyan should not overlook the other data,
the one which is not Karen Karapetyan’s but the society’s.

The other target of the poll could be Robert Kocharyan, if he is
not the ideologist of the poll. Because it is possible that he
was the ideologist, at least to show to Serge Sargsyan that if the
opposition fails to invent opponents to him, he will have invented at
least three. If nevertheless Robert Kocharyan is not the ideologist,
he is a possible target. In other words, they are trying to point
to at least three options which he can use to make Serge Sargsyan’s
absolute victory subject to struggle, in other words, not to let the
prime minister become president without assuming any responsibility. In
other words, to set forward stipulations for his presidency. Why is it
necessary? It is necessary to have the president elected not without
an obligation. If the opposition fails to do this, in other words,
to have Serge Sargsyan assume obligations, Robert Kocharyan must
do it because as a president he also had and still has obligations
before the society and the so-called international community.

The other target of the poll could be the society. The society does
not have the right to think that in any country there can be one who
has no alternative. It does not only concern the presidential election,
although in this case it concerns the presidential election.

In any question, personal or national, the society must see
alternatives. If it cannot see, it is not blind but dead. Unlike
the human body, the eye is the heart of the society’s body. If the
society can see, it is alive, if not, it is exaggerated to say there
is a society.