REAL CAMPAIGN TO START AFTER JANUARY HOLIDAYS
Naira Khachatryan
Hayots Ashkharh Daily
Dec 11 2007
Armenia
At this pre-election stage according to political scientist Alexadr
Iskandaryan it is too early to make any predictions.
According to the guest of "Tesaket" club, on the eve of the holidays
the internal political life will become quiet and the real pre-election
campaign will start only after the second half of January.
Anyway by separating Serge Sargsyan and Levon Ter-Petrosyan from
the nominated candidates, he called them real candidates campaigning
for the position of the president. "Only these two candidates have
desire to stage a serious campaign for this position. It is another
question that pre-election campaign usually pursues other goals as
well – confirmation of personal position in politics, acquirement
of levers in the future government or a simple Olympic principle –
the most important thing is participation. But those candidates whose
goal is to win the presidential post are two in Armenia. But their
chances to win is a different issue." A. Iskandaryan believes.
The activity of those two candidates, according to the speaker is
on different planes. Ter-Petrosyan is a public figure and has great
experience to work with the crowd. " He can manipulate the crowd,
he can speak, he is well aware of his advantages and uses them. He
usually works in this field.
Serge Sargsyan political figure is striking in terms of his practical
qualities: " He is a governing, organizing personality.
Which means he is a political figure that acts in quite different
domain. Thus, it turns out, in case of these two candidates we deal
with two realities that have noting to do with each other.
The political scientist described Levon Ter-Petrosyan’s return to
politics as a phenomenon that removes the campaign from the domain
being established by the parliamentary elections in May. "Without him
the campaign will take place in one domain, the same that happened
during the parliamentary elections. It is the domain of management
and organization, the sphere of those who have organizing abilities."
According to Iskandaryan it is evident that the pre-election strategy
of the ex-President is based on representing his personality as an
anti-governmental figure by means of contradictions. "That is to say
to come out against the government and to accuse them of whatever
they do. What he says, is that all the achievements the government
has, are either seeming or soon they will vanish. The path of the
countries development is wrong. That we are standing on the edge of the
canyon." This is how the speaker described Ter-Petrosyan’s ideology.
Whereas the ex-President doesn’t propose any ways out. "In essence
the strategy that L.Ter-Petrosyan is trying to realize is the same
he used in 1988, in terms of the form, tools and ideology."
The speaker didn’t; exclude the possibility of foreign influence upon
our internal processes. But they will never make open announcements
about endorsing this or that candidate. "In the level of direct
touches, in my view there will be backing – by the way for all
sides. Serge Sargsyan, Levon Ter-Petrosyan, and Dashnaktsutyun will
definitely have meetings with certain leaders out of Armenia.
They will make personal comments on those meetings. Nothing is
unequivocal."
The other seven candidates of the pre-election campaign, as well
as certain political figures such as Raffi Hovhannisyan will play
essential but "service’ roles. "I don’t see anything bad in it. What
do they struggle for? Some of them struggle for benefiting from the
situation I can’t prove it but in my opinion at the moment some
parties are even discussing the issue of making unions, to back
one of the before mentioned two candidates. Maybe I’m wrong, but as
I noticed there were more people during the second demonstration,
as compared to the first one. But there were less people during the
last demonstration. From the point of view of political dynamics it
is a negative phenomenon.
But on the other hand what happens at the moment is only and only
a preparation. But if they don’t introduce changes in their format
beginning from the New Year, Levon Ter- Petrosyan’s activity will be
considered a false start." A. Iskandaryan believes.