So far, only two candidates have said that they wish to be nominated as head of the Ajapnyak community elections on October 29 and they are the current community head, Artsroun Khachatryan, and head of the Ajapnyak community headquarters of “Republican” party, Arman Sahakyan. The other possible candidates still don’t say a word; they only spread rumors from time to time.
According to our information, the reason that the other possible candidates are not nominated is the fact that they don’t still don’t have someone to “cover them up”, people who would wish to try to use their power in that community before the upcoming 2007 parliamentary elections. It is said as well that some newly established parties are looking for compatible candidates in that community so that they can check their management skills before the upcoming parliamentary elections. They’re not in a hurry because the registration starts on September 29, accordingly they collect information so that to figure out what they can do.
On August 30, rumor had it that the newly established “Prosperous Armenia”, “Dashink” parties and “Soul Trial” NGO are going to try to nominate candidates in that community. In other words, those who want to nominate candidates are Gagik Tsarukyan, Samvel Babayan and Hakob Hakobyan. Voters of Ajapnyak community already know who will knock on their doors before the elections. According to them, “Prosperous Armenia” party has not made a decision yet whether to advocate the candidacy of Armen Amiryan (Nickname is Gechi Armenchik, by the way, it is said that he used to be a member of NU party), Rafik Mkrtchyan (has been community head for 1,5 years) or the existing community head, Artsroun Khachatryan. Rumor also has it that during the Ajapnyak community head elections in 1999, Ashot Aghababyan and Artsroun Khachatryan had conflicts, as a result of which the elections were declared as invalid, after which new elections were organized and Rafik Mkrtchyan was elected. They say that after Rafik Mkrtchyan was elected “the team from Aparan” worked against him intensively, as a result of which he resigned 1,5 years later. In spite of this flow of information in Ajapnyak community, we were informed by “Prosperous Armenia” party that they don’t advocate anyone and are not going to nominate any candidates during the coming elections in Ajapnyak community. By the way, they are not going to advocate the candidacy of Artsroun Khachatryan, who has said that “Prosperous Armenia” will advocate his candidacy for the purpose of counterbalancing “Republican” party.
We were given almost the same answer by “Dashink” party concerning the mentioned issue. Answering to our question whether they were going to advocate the candidacy of Ruben Petrosyan, the press department of “Dashink” party replied that the mentioned rumors were not true and their board had not made any decisions yet as to whose candidacy to advocate. As for Ruben Petrosyan, they told us that they didn’t have any contacts with that person. “We haven’t made a decision on having a separate candidate to be nominated”, assured the press officer of “Dashink” party.
I tried to get information on whether “Soul Trial” NGO would advocate anyone, but Hakob Hakobyan didn’t answer to our calls all day long. However, while the “Prosperous Armenia” and “Dashink” have not made a final decision, our sources of information say that Hakob Hakobyan will advocate the candidacy of Norik Galstyan, who used to work as a deputy to the community head, and just several days before resigned from his position. For your information, N. Galstyan helped A. Khachatryan during the elections of 2003, but recently they had some conflicts. It is said that their conflicts rose when “distributing the community between each other”. While some parties are making a decision as to whom to advocate or whether to be involved in the elections or not, there are rumors flying around that Arman Sahakyan has received assurances from different political powers that he would be backed by them. According to our non-official information, ULP, Rule of Law and ARF have already agreed to back him up. By the way, it is said that the reason that Rule of Law and ARF are interested in being involved in elections in this community is not the fact that it may be beneficial for them, but the fact that they may be given an opportunity to fight against head of “Nig Aparan” union, RA general prosecutor Aghvan Hovsepyan.
Currently Artsroun Khachatryan is working on removing the registration forms of the citizens whom he had brought to that community from other places to register illegally for the purpose of collecting more votes because Arman Sahakyan and Norik Galstyan are separately trying to find out and publish the illegal election techniques used by Artsroun Khachatryan during the previous elections. As for the “Republican” party, they are calm and are sure that Arman Sahakyan will win the elections regardless of the decision of the board of their party. They say that the reason they are sure that A. Sahakyan will win this time is the fact that last time, the number of the votes that A. Khachatryan collected was higher by 200-300 votes only.