FANCY DRESS PARTY OF THE FORMER AND THE PRESENT
Hakob Badalyan

Lragir, Armenia
Feb 7 2008

Levon Ter-Petrosyan’s participation in the presidential election 2008
introduced an essential component into the most frequently discussed
issues – the comparison of effectiveness of the former and the
present government. It is clear that if Levon Ter-Petrosyan did not
participate, the necessity for this comparison would disappear. In
addition, the necessity for comparing Robert Kacharyan and Serge
Sargsyan might have occurred. It is hard to say who would benefit
in that case, and also it is difficult to say who benefits from the
comparison of the former and the present governments. It is clear
that the society does not benefit at all, because in this polemics
the society is a mere observer which has to listen to one camp say
how right the former way was, and how big regress is now, and has to
listen to the other camp say how deep destruction was and what great
progress the present ones have achieved?

The curiosity of the state of the society is that the society has
lived and experienced both the former and present governments and is
going to experience the heaviness or lightness of the future government
based on the comparison of the past and the present.

Rather the heaviness because it is hardly possible to achieve anything
good if the actors of the political process only criticize one another
and do not answer any question that worries the society.

The core questions are not answered. Meanwhile, the citizens need
to know how, for instance, Levon Ter-Petrosyan claims democracy
and a legitimate election if he would not admit that the election
of 1996 was rigged, saying that there were no facts and the court
affirmed the result of the election. Meanwhile, even if it is true,
people can remember the heads of security agencies state in 1996 even
that if the opposition candidate had got 100 percent, they would not
let that candidate become president. The society also remembers that
Levon Ter-Petrosyan who had became president in a democratic way did
not respond to this anti-democratic statement of the security agencies.

Meanwhile, he could have stated briefly that the heads of the security
agencies were angry, for instance, and in reality if the opposition
candidate had got even 90 percent, they would have let him become
president.

Or the society wants to understand how Serge Sargsyan is going
to establish solidarity and national unity if the greater part of
his speeches or at least the part which is televised are about the
existence of devils, ill-minded people, slanderers and their revelation
and punishment. The impression is that Serge Sargsyan is fighting
for the post of head of a religious sect rather than president of the
country, therefore he is trying to get the pasture believe that there
are devils all around, and the religious sect will be saved if comes
together around him. Perhaps we deal with the influence of Archbishop
Navasard Kchoyan. Meanwhile, people want to understand how Serge
Sargsyan aspiring to the role of the symbol of unity is going to punish
slanderers, as he says. How are they going to distinguish a slanderer
from a solidarist? Will Serge Sargsyan make the Republican majority
adopt a law on slanderers first which will provide that a person who
doubts at least one fourth of the idea expressed by the government
is a slanderer by two thirds and should claim responsibility.

The society needs to hear the answers of many other questions from
not only Levon Ter-Petrosyan and Serge Sargsyan but also the other
seven candidates. However, the day of the voting is drawing nearer,
meanwhile no question on the future of the country and the mechanisms
of establishment of legality has been answered. We know that the
former were good and the present are bad for one, and vice versa for
another, for someone he was good others were bad in the past, and for
the other he is good and the others are bad at present, yet for some
people everything was bad and everyone was bad both before and now,
and only he is good.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress