TER-PEROSYAN TRIES TO WIN TIME
ARMEN TSATOURYAN

Hayots Ashkhar Daily
Published on May 06, 2008
Armenia

In an attempt to make the opposition join the Armenian Pan-National
Movement

L. Ter-Petrosyan’s proponents, who were looking forward to his speech
in the 2nd congress of the `Pan-National Movement’, are obviously
disappointed.

The speech-lecture that lasted an hour and a half came to show that L.
Ter-Petrosyan’s task to the revolutionaries is much more modest, while
its political trend is contradictory.

After criticizing the authorities for the March 1 events and making
attempts of self-justification, Ter-Petrosyan was satisfied with the
accusations addressed to the West and some contradictory assessments
regarding the country’s internal situation. That is, `Authorities, you
should comply with the requirements of the PACE Resolution, and we will
continue insisting that you are not legitimate. We will be in favor of
any political pressure against the Armenian authorities, but we will
fight economic pressure. And in case Azerbaijan allows any encroachment
upon Karabakh, we will unanimously settle down to the protection of our
motherland.’

However, muddled up in his own questions, the ex-President never
explained the potential impact of the Western pressure upon the
Karabakh peace process.

Thereafter, the proponents of the ex-President were anticipating him to
clarify his future political steps, but that never happened. It turned
out that Ter-Petrosyan had nothing to say in that connection, at least
at the moment of making his speech, and he continued insisting on his
unilateral conditions for initiating a dialogue.

The following question comes up: what was the purpose of convening the
congress? Judging by all, Ter-Petrosyan’s speech was directed at the
goal of maintaining the political position he had gained during the
electoral campaign. In this regard, we can understand Ter-Petrosyan’s
concerns since it is impossible to maintain so many political alliances
formed around one personality in the pre-election period. Clearly,
controversies and disruptions inside such artificial unions become
inevitable.

Moreover, maintaining the alliance is a much more difficult task than
changing its image, as the latter always contains an anticipation of
new and interesting solutions. This may account for the new idea
proposed by Ter-Petrosyan, i.e. the initiative of setting up an
`Armenian National Congress’ which is supposed to `unite’ but never
assimilate different political factions that supported the
ex-President’s candidacy during the recent presidential elections. The
Political Council and the Executive Body supporting Ter-Petrosyan are
supposed to fit themselves into a new political `framework’ before
further clarifications.

Trying to find a justification for the `Armenian National Congress’,
Ter-Petrosyan mentioned in his speech that they had taken into
consideration `both the glorious traditions of national democratic
movements and the multi-layer ideological and social representation’.
That’s to say, the imitation of the international experience pursues
the goal of protecting the pro-Ter-Petrosyan camp from ideological
disagreements and conflicts of interests which become inevitable in the
post-electoral period.

Of course, the proposal of setting up a `National Congress’ did have
its precedent in the world history, but only in the form of the
structures characteristic of the era of national-liberation movements.
`The Indian National Congress’, for instance, was one of them. The
latter was characterized by its tactics of struggling against the
English colonists through peaceful, bloodless methods, as well as the
aspiration of protecting the national values.

But what does the experience of India and other countries have to do
with the political goals of Ter-Petrosyan and his proponents who have
found themselves in uncertainty after the unsuccessful attempts of
staging a `colored revolution’? It may seem to some people that by
doing this, the participants of the March 1 events wanted to imitate
the peaceful and democratic methods adopted by the Indian leaders.
However, we should keep in mind that the objectives of Ter-Petrosyan,
i.e. the `creation of a free, democratic and prosperous state governed
by rule of law’, is not absolutely the task of a national liberation
movement which is based upon nationality, language and other
fundamental values.

We believe the given name deriving from the rich experience of the
national-liberation movements of India and other countries has been
chosen just as some attractive framework that may lead to the solution
of the problem of winning time and making the forces that supported
Ter-Petrosyan’s candidacy during the elections join the Armenian
Pan-National Movement. This will help them to finally clear themselves
of the label of `flawed activists’.

As to the other parties which supported them, they will simply make
`The Armenian National Congress’ a springboard for quitting the
political arena by disguising their own weakness and final
depersonalization.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress