DEMOCRACY NEEDS PROTECTION FROM DEMAGOGY
Lilit Poghosyan

Hayots Ashkhar Daily
March 21, 2008

President Robert Kocharyan sums up the lessons of March 1

Yesterday, President ROBERT KOCHARYAN convened a press conference with
the purpose of summing up the lessons of March 1 and the results of
the emergency measures imposed by the state of emergency

In the estimation of R. Kocharyan, "the regime of the state of
emergency made it possible to avoid greater losses and graver
consequences, stabilize the situation and strengthen the stabilization
process by specific actions." The results are satisfactory, "no
violation of the state of emergency was observed during the past 20
days; the Army and the Police demonstrated restraint during their
service, and the overwhelming majority of the population approached
the situation with understanding. In the present-day condition, all
the state agencies work without disruption, and life is returning to
its regular course."

Hence, the President sees no reason to extend the regime of the state
of emergency, so, as decided previously, the capital city will return
to its usual rhythm.

"My goal is to achieve the full stabilization of the situation. It is
necessary to make the situation as controllable as it was before the
elections. I must transfer the power to the newly elected President
in such stable and controllable situation," R. Kocharyan confirmed.

As regards the criminal case instituted in connection with the mass
disorders, its inquest is under way. "The approach declared previously
is in force. The people who were misled or simply appeared in the
scene of action and participated in the disorders will be treated
more mildly in case of appearing in the law enforcement agencies
voluntarily and assisting the investigative group. The regime of the
state of emergency did not envisage additional privileges and rights
for the law enforcement agencies, and their activity will continue
in the frameworks of the same legislation."

What lessons can be learnt from what happened? "First, democracy
needs protection from demagogy. I consider it to be one of the most
important lessons. We have carried out large-scale reforms in most
different spheres: both in the economic and the state government
system, but life showed that it was necessary to strengthen the
mechanisms ensuring the security of our citizens and the property
belonging to them. The foundations of the statehood should be protected
legislatively. Unfortunately, these events made it clear that our
legislation does not envisage a number of articles which are enforced
in almost all the European countries. For instance, if someone in
Germany had appealed to servicemen and police officers not to serve,
take sides with the demonstrators and avoid performing their duties,
he/she would have been sentenced to 5 years in prison, together with
the organizers of the demonstration."

Many countries enforce a much stricter punishment for such kind of
people; therefore, considering the international experience, our
legislation should be replenished by clear-cut mechanisms protecting
the foundations of the state from such encroachments, the President
is convinced. It wasn’t done up to date because it couldn’t have
occurred to anyone that "There might be people in Armenia for whom
the task of disorganizing the state machine could become a goal of
life. We came in collision with such bitter reality and must draw
relevant conclusions thereof. It is necessary to undertake serious
legislative steps in that direction."

The next lesson is that "it is necessary to undertake decisive steps
to rule out the involvement of some non-governmental organizations
in politics.

For instance, ‘The Trial of Spirit’, a veteran’s organization,
was almost entirely involved in the post-electoral processes; a
lot of members of that organization were active participants of the
disorders. It is also well known that a large group of ‘Yerkrapah’
activists also participated in all that. We cannot now say which
organizations had participation and which organizations didn’t,
but some of them did really take part in the disorders.

Such prospect should be ruled out in future. And no organization
should make attempts to turn the events to this or that side, taking
itself for a ‘joker’. This is an extremely serious danger to the state.

I am sure that it is also necessary to establish a stricter liability
for preaching violence, as well as for the steps that may lead to
violence," R. Kocharyan stated. The President also added that in
this case too, the legislation of the European countries envisages
a stricter punishment for the violation of the law.

What steps do the authorities intend to carry out in case the
opposition, faithful to its ‘promise’, celebrates the historic moment
of lifting the state of emergency by resuming the massive brainwashing
process? "If the demonstrations are not authorized, the Police will
be obliged to prevent them immediately. The demonstrations held for
9 days continuously were not prevented by the Police for one reason:
I didn’t allow them to do that since there was a process of recounting
under way, and any abrupt steps might be viewed as an attempt of
disrupting the appeals process.

I am sure I did the right thing. If, on the second day of the
unauthorized demonstrations, there had been a more abrupt intervention,
it’s quite possible that we wouldn’t be facing such grave consequences
now. I am not going to intervene now; on the contrary, I will demand
that all the steps deriving from the law be carried out," R. Kocharyan
confirmed.

Especially considering that, "People who used arms and explosives
against the Police are still under investigation, and there’s no
guarantee that they will not try to resort to new provocations with
the purpose of messing up the situation and avoiding responsibility."

And what’s the President’s attitude towards the rumors on dissolving
the Parliament and appointing new elections? "I am familiar with
that opinion. I do not absolutely accept the approach for one simple
reason: extraordinary parliamentary elections are appointed in one
case, that is, when the Parliament cannot have a political majority
and form a government.

We have no such problem. This is just an alphabet in the process of
state building and politics in general.

Besides, we are well aware that no election in Armenia has ever led
to soothing passions. So, does it make sense to enter into a new cycle
which will make the situation more complicated?" R. Kocharyan stated.

The internal and external "demands" on conducting an independent
inquiry are no less illogical and incomprehensible. This, however,
doesn’t mean that the President is against inviting specialists
from abroad and conducting a thorough study of the events, first of
all, the circumstances of the death cases. What’s more, the inquest
authority already benefits from the services of foreign experts. The
possibility of setting up a temporary parliamentary committee with
the purpose of studying those cases is not ruled out either. But
this will be feasible only after the court makes a legal assessment
on the events and the activities of the accused.

Anyway, what to do with the 350 thousand electors who voted in favor
of LTP, as these people won’t admit the election results? What to do
to mitigate the continuing tension? In response to this question,
the President brought the example of the Western practice, when
presidents are elected with an advantage of 1-2 percent of votes,
but "nobody makes a tragedy of that, saying ‘because 40.9 percent
of the people think a different way, it is necessary to change the
Constitution, implement systemic changes, dissolve the Parliament’
etc. It is a matter of political culture.

Yes, after each election, there will be a large mass of electors
that haven’t voted in favor of the authorities. We cannot raise the
issue every time in order to have the state system changed. In 2003,
Stepan Demirtchyan received more votes than L. Ter-Petrosyan – during
these elections. Does this mean we have to change the state system?"