Before the Constitutional referendum, when the opposition was actively announcing that November 27 would be the beginning of the collapse of the authorities, different American experts were being sent to Armenia to find out whether it was possible to start a revolution or not.
In that period, Richard Kirakosyan also visited Armenia. Richard Kirakosyan is a famous analyzer in Washington and specialist of economical and military development issues of post Soviet states, Central Asia and Middle East. In his interview given to “168 Hours”, he said that Armenia couldn’t start the same revolutions that took place in Georgia and Ukraine. According to him only the social method of starting a revolution can be successful in Armenia. This means that the Armenian opposition has to mobilize citizens on the basis of problems of social character. He also pointed out which problems were outstanding and could be used. For instance discrimination, violations of human rights and other problems can be good mechanisms to bring people out to squares.
According to Mr. Kirakosyan the opposition can’t be successful by using the issue of legitimacy of the authorities and the Karabagh conflict.
We tried to ask the opposition, which has recently been passive, whether Mr. Kirakosyan is not right and it would be better of them to speak about problems of social character more than legitimacy. We also asked why they didn’t use the fifth block of the Hrazdan electric station and the gas price increase issues to get people active in discussions. Member of “Justice” alliance, head of ADP Aram G. Sargsyan says that their party has always brought up problems of social character. But meanwhile he noted, “In 2003 we made the alliance recover the Constitutional rights in Armenia, but our priority was social problems. Even more, most of our announcements concern the social field and I think this can serve good reasons to make people active. That is why I told people from the parliament that they shouldn’t wait for anything, they should stand up and we will lead them. Of course we don’t say that we won’t bear any responsibility”, said Aram Gasparich. We asked him how people should act if they are disappointed about social problems but still don’t know what exactly to do. “Yes, people should be ready to stand up and shouldn’t wait for anyone. For instance now they say that they like some oppositional powers and dislike the others…They shouldn’t care about these problems. They should choose their leader themselves and tell him that they are joining him to solve some certain problems. The problem is that activities back in 2003-2004 stopped also because of the opposition, and then it was not realistic to mobilize people in 2005. I don’t mean that people didn’t want this, I just mean that it wasn’t appropriate. I think that now, when the political field has turned into a criminal one and is getting bigger, it is time for people to stand up and speak out. I will call on people again and this is the problem that will lead them to stand up”, says Aram G. Sargsyan.
As for Artashes Geghamyan, his approach to what Mr. Kirakosyan thinks is different. “It is pity for me that Mr. Kirakosyan wants to take on the role of political spiritual leader, because I think that those people who work on starting revolutions can’t offer any alternatives for gas price increase or other problems. And in case of such revolutions the new leaders, whose slogans will be “decreasing gas prices”, will get confused and will leave the political field being more disappointed than the former ones”, said Artashes Geghamyan. So this means that Artashes Geghamyan doesn’t care about what Richard Kirakosyan offers and recommends him to read the writings of Samuel Johnson one more time, who has already made such predictions long before.
As for the head of “Heritage” party, Raffi Hovhannisyan, who says that he doesn’t know whether it is involved in politics or not, thinks that social problems should be discussed actively, serve as reasons for mobilizing people, but are not enough yet. “In regard to the gas price increase there is both a social factor and serious problems connected with governmental authorities. The fact that the fifth bloc has been given to Russia may resist the activation of people for some time, but some time later these problems will be brought up again because now we don’t have any real solutions for our strategic problems. This problem could be solved in another way too. In this phase, we are passive”, said Raffi Hovhannisyan during our conversation with him.
As for head of “Republic” party, Aram Z. Sargsyan, he thinks that the recent developments can be really good reasons for activation. “If this was the only problem in Armenia it wouldn’t be enough to start a revolution. But there are so many downsides in all fields of our country that this problem will serve as just one more reason for serious changes in our country, as well as leading to a revolution, because this problem doesn’t concern only the social field of our society, but also undermines the independence of our country”, says Aram Z. Sargsyan.