OUSTING OF KIND OF CITIZEN

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13:35:47 – 11/02/2010

Samvel Partamyan: designer-publicist, teaches at the University
of Architecture

During our previous interview, you said we have to find our place
under sun in this region.

Now, some political processes are solved or are near to their
solution. Now we can say if our government and the opposition are
completed and whether they correspond to the internal and external
challenges.

We may say that the government is completed as much as it could. More,
it already started showing its continuance and its qualities. A series
of surprises in the foreign policy – Armenian-Turkish relations,
principles of Madrid refreshed the public’s political context and
became a reason for dialogues and revision of stereotypes.

As to home political challenges, the government tried to preserve its
rough and unceasing behavior adopted after March 1 as much as home
and foreign pressure let it to. Perhaps, the only home political
new initiative is the governmental religious-moral initiative in
contradiction to real morality, justice, human rights and freedom
of speech.

But this completeness of the government makes evident new vulnerable
sides, the decrease of self-confidence. The motive "no one can harm
us" became ambiguous.

Who managed to "get rid of" the government?

You know it is possible to ignore the society for a long time, but to
use power without the support of the public is impossible. The power
stopped being the only representative of the state. The equality
between state and power stopped existing, this perception is split
within the Diaspora too. Not accidentally, today main questions are
asked not the government but the opposition. And now I think the
point is not about the opposition but the society which is to realize
that the opposition is the model of the government in a dynamic
phase which is not defended by means of the power. In other words,
opposition is power which can be modeled and still created. Now the
attention of the public is to be focused on the creation of the model
of the opposition as a future government.

New forces, new initiatives and new discussions. You are participating
in them too. What can they change in our life? Are now times of birth
of ideas?

Birth of ideas is a permanent process. Crises promote the
modernization of the public. But the life of the public does not
need to be accelerated too much. Today’s opposition is a result of
public initiative and demand. Today we live in the possession of
the government dangerous for the public and a state not defending the
security of the public. For example, all of us know that the government
will try to preserve its reproduction but the society, the interested
part of it, is ready to sacrifice its cultural and moral values for
the sake of its ideas and values, like Nikol Pashinyan did on March
1. I think ousting of this kind of citizen is taking place and the
current opposition is the fight of such kind of people.

What developments do you see in the world?

I think, regardless political processes that can contain surprises,
the future of Armenia is really in the hands of the Armenian people who
have to be participants of the creation of a new political structure,
a new government.

In reality, the model of my imagination is the one of human rights,
freedom of speech, equal possibilities. These are not abstract
concepts. These are necessary conditions for the development of the
society and for the country’s security.

Interview By Siranuysh Papyan