ARMENIAN TYCOON EYES RECORD-HIGH NUMBER OF VOTES
By Ruzanna Stepanian
Radio Liberty, Czech Rep.
March 22 2007
A leading member of he Prosperous Armenia Party (BHK) of businessman
Gagik Tsarukian predicted Thursday that it will garner at least
370,000 votes in the upcoming parliamentary elections, which is almost
certainly enough to win them by a landslide.
The minimum figure cited by Vartan Bostanjian, a member of the BHK’s
governing board, equals the number of members the party claims to have,
making it by far the largest political organization in the country.
Asked by RFE/RL whether all of those members will go to the polls and
vote for the BHK on May 12, Bostanjian said, "I think so." "In the
event of free, fair and transparent elections, the figure should be
even higher," he added, arguing that not only BHK members but their
friends and relatives will vote for Tsarukian’s party.
By comparison, the governing Republican Party of Armenia (HHK), the
official winner of the last parliamentary elections, won only 290,000
votes. That made up 23.7 percent of some 1.22 million Armenians
who took part in the ballot, according to the Central Election
Commission. The Armenian opposition and even some pro-government
parties said at the time that both the number of the HHK votes and
the official voter turnout of 51 percent are grossly inflated.
The BHK, which is widely regarded as President Robert Kocharian’s new
power base, claims to have recruited hundreds of thousands of members
across Armenia in the course of last year. It has clearly capitalized
on Tsarukian’s populist appeal and large-scale "benevolent" actions
which many established parties consider a wholesale vote-buying.
Parliament speaker Tigran Torosian, who is affiliated with the HHK,
openly challenged the credibility of the BHK’s membership claims last
week. "If this is the case, then all parties must altogether disband
themselves before the elections," Torosian told reporters. "Because
if we add to the 370,000 [members] a certain number of other voters,
who are relatives of BHK members, we’ll get a huge figure."
"In my view, no Armenian party can poll that many votes, unless,
of course, Armenia one day again becomes a Communist country," he said.
Speaking at a news conference, Bostanjian refused to comment on
Torosian’s remarks. He also denied media allegations that many
Armenians are being forced or paid to join the Kocharian-connected
tycoon’s party.
"We have not used forcible or any other illicit methods," said
Bostanjian. "People themselves ask to join the party. We are a proud
party that does not want artificial votes."
Although many observers consider the BHK and the HHK the frontrunners
in the race, it is not clear just how popular Tsarukian’s party is.
Credible opinion polls are still a rarity in Armenia. Opposition
leaders fear that the BHK’s spectacular membership claims will be
used for legitimizing possible vote rigging.
Bostanjian, who is a senior economics professor at Yerevan State
University, further dismissed speculation that Tsarukian evades taxes
and gets away with that owing to his close ties with Kocharian. "I am
convinced that he pays taxes [in full,]" he said. "Relevant authorities
have not brought any [tax evasion] cases against the leader of our
party. Isn’t that sufficient proof [of his innocence?]"
Despite Tsarukian’s reputation as a Armenia’s wealthiest "oligarch,"
the amount of taxes paid by his businesses is quite modest. The
largest of those businesses, a chain of liquefied and compressed
gas stations, was only 84th in the latest rankings of the country’s
top corporate taxpayers compiled by the State Tax Service (STS). The
company, Multi-Leon, paid only about 500 million drams ($1.4 million)
in various taxes last year.
