We called the Sevan branch of “Union for Armenia” party to ask for information about their activities. A person named Garik answered the phone and said that there wasn’t anyone besides him in the office at that moment. As Garik said, everyone had left the office because they no longer believed that they would find what they had been seeking for in that party. He said that everything was complicated in their region and that some people believed that the party would be a success, while others said that it would soon dissolve. “Vahram Baghdasaryan says that estimations are made later on and that they should count the number of party members in the fall too. Our situation is bad in Sevan, we don’t know what to do and how long we have to wait. A month ago everything was good, but now we don’t know what is going to happen to us”, said Garik.
We received almost the same answer from the UFA party branch of the Tashir region. We were told one month before they had been working normally, but later they stopped working. “Every day we come to the office, talk to each other and than leave home. What should we do?” this is what the UFA Tashir region office told “168 Hours”. We asked them what they were going to do and they replied that they didn’t know and that they would stay with Karen Karapetyan’s team wherever he was. This means that the situation in Tashir is better for them than in the other regions, because if Karen Karapetyan joins the Republican party, their headquarters in Tashir region will work for that party too. “He is our Deputy, we respect him, we will do whatever he tells us to do”, said that party officer from Shirak region.
Although UFA regional representatives are pessimistic, however co-founder of UFA, Vahram Baghdasaryan is optimistic. He has met with the party activists of Vanadzor region, and will visit other regions and will meet their party members as well in the next couple of days. “There isn’t anything dangerous for us; we are working and are meeting people. As for those representatives that are disappointed, I think they didn’t make a good choice. We are going to organize meetings in Marzes of Armenia and buy necessary facilities for our regional headquarters. We will revise our strategy and those who haven’t understood so far what the party is going to do, will have to leave their positions for other people”. V. Baghdasaryan assured us that their party had a lot to do, but noted that for that purpose their party needed huge human resources. “We don’t organize shows. The heavier you are the faster you will fall down. We don’t want to appear in such a position. We are doing our work the way we have to do it,” assured V. Baghdasaryan. In response to the fact about the above mentioned note of a representative of their party saying that there will be no results in the fall for the party, V. Baghdasaryan said, “Very soon we will check up our regional headquarters and will replace members that think there will be no results”. V. Baghdasaryan says that they will organize a board meeting in October, and before that they will meet with people and visit their regional headquarters. V. Baghdasaryan says that the process is very difficult and there is much work to do. “You can’t know everything and everyone well and say that everything is fine in the headquarters. People are different and we can’t know what they will do in the future”, says V. Baghdasaryan and adds that this is the reason why they don’t organize only one meeting in each Marz, but several meetings. After these meetings they have to visit the regions again and see what is happening there. We asked V. Baghdasaryan whether they didn’t experience difficulties with human resources because there were over 70 political parties in Armenia and for newly established parties it was very difficult to find non-partisan people and recruit them. There have been cases in Marzes when people joined several parties at one time. Concerning this V. Baghdasaryan said, “This is a serious problem because no one can be sure whether those members have joined other parties as well or not”.
We asked V. Baghdasaryan what would happen to UFA if Karen Karapetyan joined the Republican party because many people had joined the UFA not in favor of Armenia but in favor of Karen Karapetyan, to which he answered, “In fact, the situation has changed, this is the reason why I say that we should revise our strategy and make changes in our regional headquarters”, said co-founder of UFA Vahram Baghdasaryan and added that they had made such changes in Aragatsotn and Gegharkunik.
P.S. According to the information of UFA as of last week, the party had 29.750 members. They continue recruiting members and this number may go up to 30.000.