Astghik Gevorgyan, Head of the Union of Journalists of Armenia (AJU), summarized her 25 years in this position. “One of the journalists today asked me a question: what do you leave in the Union of Journalists? I said I leave a unanimous unity. During the meetings of the unity no insult was ever heard.”
30 years ago was the last congress of the Union. There was no solidarity in today’s congress. Lavrenti Mirzoyan, former member of the union, said that the congress was illegal, has no mandate, and there was no presidency. “Our last congress took place in 1986, a century ago; now we are in the 21st century, now most of the members of the presidency are dead, how can we find those people?”
The issue of the age and death became the subjects of the congress of the Union. The average age of the members of the Union is 65.
The AJU member Hakob Martouni said, “Forget about the Union of Journalists of Armenia, it it died 40 years ago, it is in grave, it is rotten, does not exist.”
68-year-old Aram Sargsyan did not like the topic of the dead. “Why are you talking about the dead? Do you register who here are? It is a nursing home, a nursing home!”
About 80-year-old man, Sergey Hayrapetyan, demanded from the union a civil stance. They immediately silence him for the sake of the reglament. “Oh, please, look at your age.”
85 years’ old Astghik Gevorgyan, who was the head of the Union for 25 years, leaves the post.
The HHK (Republican Party) MP Margarit Yesayan had a young candidate, journalist Satik Seyranyan. “I look at the faces of the people, all of us are old, let’s confess this, and I think this structure needs a new younger drive.”
Some of the members did not know the candidate.
Satik Seyranyan represented the future Union of Journalists, the way she imagined it, with a trade union and funded projects. “I urge my colleagues working in the media and individual journalists to join the Union of Journalists of Armenia.”
Another candidate, Harutyun Tsatryan, a PhD student at the YSU Faculty of Journalism, said directly from the tribune that he had no right to be nominated as he had been the member of the Union only for three years. He also considered the convention illegal. “We seem to boost those illegitimacy.”
In the end, Satik Seyranyan became the head of the Union with 57 votes. Another candidate did not vote for himself.