TER-PETROSIAN SAYS CONFIDENT ABOUT ELECTION CHANCES
By Astghik Bedevian

Radio Liberty, Czech Rep.
Dec 24 2007

Former President Levon Ter-Petrosian portrayed Armenia’s upcoming
presidential election as a showdown between himself and Prime Minister
Serzh Sarkisian as he received fresh pledges of allegiance from about
two dozen opposition parties over the weekend.

Addressing hundreds of their activists who gathered for a one-day
conference in Yerevan, Ter-Petrosian said he will be Sarkisian’s
main challenger because none of the other opposition candidates has
managed to muster multi-partisan support for their presidential bids.

He claimed that some of them are secretly collaborating with the
Armenian authorities to prevent him from returning to power.

"No other candidate has consolidated so many influential forces,
something which allows one to speak about, if not the emergence of
a single opposition candidate, but at least the formation of a clear
pole opposed to the regime," he said.

Ter-Petrosian dismissed as fraudulent opinion polls which show him
trailing not only Sarkisian but also other candidates. He argued that
he has been the main target of attacks by pro-government politicians
and media in recent weeks. "Isn’t it obvious that if the published
ratings were authentic, there would be no need for such edginess
[on the part of the government] and Serzh Sarkisian would stand
in the elections to the accompaniment of folk music and a brass
band?" he said.

Ter-Petrosian’s presidential bid has so far been endorsed by 17 mostly
small parties strongly opposed to Armenia’s present leadership. Among
those parties are the former ruling Armenian Pan-National Movement
(HHSh), the radical opposition Hanrapetutyun party and the People’s
Party of Stepan Demirchian, the main opposition candidate in the last
presidential election. In his speech, Ter-Petrosian referred to them
as his core support base.

The former president also denounced as "bogus candidates" other
opposition heavyweights who have refused to rally around him. In an
apparent reference to Artashes Geghamian and possibly Vazgen Manukian,
he said they joined the presidential race on government orders with
the aim of discrediting him and thereby facilitating a "reproduction"
of the ruling regime.

Both Geghamian and Manukian say they refused to throw their weight
behind Ter-Petrosian because they believe his track record in
government was no better than that of the current authorities in
Yerevan. They also insist that they remain in opposition to the
administration of President Robert Kocharian. Observers note, however,
that both prominent oppositionists have toned down their criticism
of the government of late.

In his speech, Ter-Petrosian sounded confident about his chances of
defeating Sarkisian, saying that he will visit all regions of Armenia
and meet "as many people as possible" during his election campaign.

He also told loyalists that he will draw on his experience as a leader
of the 1988 movement for Nagorno-Karabakh’s unification with Armenia
which brought down the republic’s last Communist government in 1990.

"Our authorities are no more invincible than the government of
the Soviet Union. If we managed to defeat [Soviet leader Mikhail]
Gorbachev, then what prevents us from defeating Robert Kocharian and
Serzh Sarkisian?" he said to rapturous applause.

Hanrapetutyun’s outspoken leader, Aram Sarkisian, appeared to answer
this question in his own speech at the gathering. "For the ruling
[Sarkisian-Kocharian] pair, retaining power is a matter of life or
death," Sarkisian said. "That is why they are gearing up for a fight,
not an election. A fight against Levon Ter-Petrosian."