"TODAY’S DYNAMIC SITUATION IS INDEX OF SERIOUSNESS OF ELECTIONS," ALEXANDER ISKANDARIAN BELIEVES

Noyan Tapan
Feb 14, 2008

YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 14, NOYAN TAPAN. The pre-electoral situation in
Armenia is developing too dynamically and at present, it is very
difficult to foresee who will be the winner and how many stages
there will be. This statement was made by Alexander Iskandarian,
the Director of the Caucasus Media Institute, at the press conference
held on February 13.

In his words, the very quickly changing situation is the index of
the seriousness of the presidential elections in Armenia. Beside the
dynamism, the current electoral processes differ in their multisemantic
character. In particular, the situation is that both the supporters
of Ter-Petrosian and those of Serge Sargsian are absolutely sincerely
sure of the victory of their candidate in the very first stage.

As regards the recent visit of the first President to Moscow and the
possibility of the influence of that visit on the further development
of the processes, Iskandarian mentioned that not the external but the
internal factor plays a decisive role in the electoral processes as
both Russia, the United States of America, as well as other countries
are ready to work with any elected president of Armenia. Meanwhile,
in the words of Iskandarian, the candidates are trying to make use
of the external factor as their additional weapon in the struggle
against each other.

The analyst mentioned that the use of the administrative resource
will play a great role in these elections like in the previous
ones. However, he had some difficulty in unequivocally answering the
question of whether the mechanism of the pre-electoral bribe will
work. "In the parliamentary elections the Armenian people consciously
sold its voices. However, the situation has greatly changed for the
past three months and we cannot surely say today whether people will
take bribe." In his words, this very circumstance is the result of
the changes, which have recently taken place in society.

Alexander Iskandarian had difficulty in forseeing whether introduction
of state of emergency is possible by the authorities. In his words,
the development of further events will depend on the circumstance of
how the elections will pass, what marks the international observers
will give, what will be the result of the first stage.