THE PRISONERS OF MEMORY
James Hakobyan

Lragir
Oct 31 2007
Armenia

If Levon Ter-Petrosyan had started his address with self-criticism,
everything would have been different, Hrant Margaryan, member of the
ARF Bureau, told Radio Liberty. In fact, it turns out that the ARF
Dashnaktsutyun is also reminding the first president of the past.

Meanwhile, Levon Ter-Petrosyan and the ARF Dashnaktsutyun were said
to have agreed in their meeting to forget about the past and debate
about the future. Especially Dashnaktsutyun should not remind anything
after this agreement. Meanwhile, Dashnaktsutyun seems to have changed
their mind, at least it is felt from Hrant Margaryan’s words. Perhaps
Dashnaktsutyun did not believe first that Ter-Petrosyan would be
nominated, and when reaching agreement on not remembering the past
in a meeting with him they perhaps expected that the cease-fire with
Levon Ter-Petrosyan would raise the rating of the ARF Dashnaktsutyun,
not ruling out that some of Ter-Petrosyan’s supporters would be
touched and vote for Dashnaktsutyun. In other words, if a few weeks
ago Ter-Petrosyan was a guest for the ARF Dashnaktsutyun whom they
received nicely and forgave a lot of things, now Levon Ter-Petrosyan
is an opponent to the ARF Dashnaktsutyun.

Like in the joke when an Armenian gets caught by cannibals, and when
they are playing the drums before eating him, the Armenian notices
that one of them is playing the drum in an Armenian manner. "Are you
an Armenian?" he asks. "Yes I am hungry," the answer is.

Levon Ter-Petrosyan is already an opponent, including for the ARF
Dashnaktsutyun, consequently, their agreement will be gradually
forgotten because in political struggle in Armenia, no matter how
ideological it is, the memories of the past have a core importance.

They are reminding the All-Armenian Movement and Levon Ter-Petosyan of
the years of the energy crisis, robbery, defensiveness and all those
events that Levon Ter-Petrosyan himself enumerated during the rally
on Octover 26. They are reminding Dashnaktsutyun of the past, from
1918’s getting the public money and running away till now when they
are again getting the public money but not running away yet, probably
waiting until they get all of it. They are reminding the Orinats Yerkir
party how its leader supported Ter-Petrosyan, then Robert Kocharyan,
then joined the coalition. They are reminding the National Solidarity
party about its leader’s communist career, career as mayor, support
for Robert Kocharyan in 1998. They are reminding Vazgen Manukyan about
his office as prime minister in 1991, the privatization of land, the
unrest in 1996, the heads of Babken Ararxian and Ara Sahakyan. They
are reminding Robert Kocharyan and Serge Sargsyan about their party
committee and young communist careers, then All-Armenian Movement
affiliation, then the coup in 1998, then October 27.

There is much more that the political forces are reminding each
other through the political struggle, point by point, case by case,
hour by hour, minute by minute. No doubt each political activist
in Armenia keeps a diary, like teenagers, but instead of lyrical
feelings he puts down the detailed description of their and others’
actions. As soon as one competes with another, he opens the diary,
although he knows the opponent has opened his own notes. Hence,
the Armenian political sphere is unable to rid of the past and at
least reach the present. For them, the present is for "enriching"
the past rather than building the future, which is quite normal when
no mechanism of political responsibility works in the country.