ARF’S POSITION IS A POLITICAL NECESSITY
By Sevak Hakobian

Yerkir, Armenia
Oct 1 2007

A meeting of ARF’s regional bodies was convened on September 25 to
discuss the decisions adopted by the ARF’s XI Supreme Convention. In
his statement representative of the ARF’s Supreme Body Armen Rustamian
noted that the issues discussed during the Supreme Convention were
very serious and will have a great importance in defining the party’s
further strategy.

"The convention assessed the parliamentary elections as a comparative
success for our party because it was the third time we participated
in elections since 1999 and we have doubled the number of seats we
got since then." Rustamian believes great efforts should be exerted
to ensure that the issues included into the party’s pre-election
platform are included into the government’s program. "We were rather
successful in this respect and the government’s program we have today
was largely modified based on our recommendations."

Political culture should be formed in our country after all

Rustamian pointed to the right to nominate a presidential candidate
as the main reason for the format of cooperation with the government.

The issue of nominating the presidential candidate was the main issue
on the agenda of the party’s General Convention.

The candidate’s name will be announced during the extraordinary
General Convention that will be held in November. Meanwhile, the
party will work to clarify its further actions. "I should state that
there is no questioning among any of our party’s structures that
the Supreme Convention should make the decision as to nominating its
candidate during the presidential elections. It is really a political
necessity for our country and our party that the ARF nominates its own
candidate," Rustamian said. Rustamian believes this mode of nominating
the party’s candidate will be widely discussed.

"This procedure exists in different countries. Of course we are still
far away from such political culture but we must have it in our country
some day if we speak about having serious traditions of political
culture. The ARF is serving an example by adhering to this procedure."

There is a necessity for changing the ARF’s role

The Supreme Convention significantly clarified one of the widely
discussed questions: what does ARF mean when declaring itself an
alternative both for the government and for the opposition. "We have
stated the main threats and obstacles to the country’s political
development and the problems we believe need an urgent solution to
ensure that the country’s democratic development goes in the right
direction," Rustamian said adding,

"The main reason for the slow down in the development is that the
government’s actions to eliminate these obstacles have unfortunately
been not sufficient, these were semi-measures and semi-solutions.

These semi-measures have resulted in tremendous resistance and it is
simply necessary to resort to revolutionary tendencies to eliminate
these obstacles."

This is where, according to Rustamian, the ARF differs from its
partners despite having strategic similarities with them. "We have
always spoken about these problems. However, unfortunately, our
approaches have never been fully accepted and we see a necessity for
changing our role." The ARF sees itself as an alternative for the
opposition because the for the opposition struggle is the goal and
not the means making change of the political regime an end in itself.

ARF invites for a debate

We should struggle against the opinion formed after the parliamentary
elections that the outcome of the presidential elections is already
determined and there is not point in political struggle. Rustamian
believes, "This simply means paralyzing the political life and driving
the political forces out of the political arena. We are against this
and the ARF’s participation in the presidential elections with its
own candidate is the main factor that can counter such moods."

The ARF is ready to launch a debate in the country in this context.

The ARF has already declared that it is not going to use
anti-campaigning methods because it does not intend to point out
this or that party’s failures or drawbacks. The ARF aims at finding
efficient solutions for the problems the country is facing and is
inviting everyone for a debate on these issues.

"We should eliminate the moods that there is only one candidate that
has no alternative because he has no competitors. No, we must create
this competitor, we must show that there is a competitor who sets goals
and pursues them. The image of this competitor should be formed around
our approaches. I am sure that as soon as the image of the competitor
is formed many political forces will accept our approaches and will
unite around us during the next phase," Rustamian concluded.