– Since stepping down of the office you have started criticizing the activities of the authorities. From the prospective of the foreign policy it is understandable as you were the foreign minister for ten years, but you are criticizing the policy of the government, including the economic policy. What is the goal of your critics besides being an Armenian and caring about the future of the country?
– The only goal of my activity is to have a normal country. Twenty years have passed since the independence but we are too far from having a normal state. As a result of this people don’t live well. Twenty years have passed but we still live bad; people are leaving from the country and institutions don’t work. Being ten years in the government was a great experience for me as I was in contact with everybody and I understood the good and bad sides. And when the ten years of my office finished, I understood that our biggest challenges are not out of the country, but inside of our own country. We should speak more about the internal challenges. Only after solving the problems inside our own country we will be able to address the external problems. This is the stimulus that made me resign from the government in order to have free hands to be able to speak about all the problems that I believe are obstacles for future development. I decided to establish this foundation, which will support the development of the civil society to solve those problems.
– The situation in the political sector is weird because it seems that the opposition powers are struggling against each other rather than against the government. What is the reason?
– I hope the opposition will not be mistaken. They should understand that their goal must be creating a political counterbalance in the parliament during the next parliamentary elections. Each of those parties must have these goals and build their activities on this goal, otherwise there will be absolute majority of pro-government parties in the parliament as it happened as a result of the previous elections. One party will make a decision and others will oppose and the problems will not be solved. The biggest political problem in Armenia now is the political monopoly. If we fail to work this out, it will be impossible for us to address the other economic, social, political, democratic issues. During the upcoming elections they must use the political opportunities to fight monopolies out and adopt a real system of coalition government. Democracy did not create this mechanism; if there is no counterbalance, there is no democracy. Currently the governing party is doing everything to go through the path of political usurpation in order to have majority during the next elections and be reproduced during the parliamentary and presidential elections.
– The government is acting as they subsidize the gas used by needy families, as well as are taking measures to solve some problems in the sector of agriculture. Does not this mean that the authorities are working for people?
– These are pre-election activities, which means that the authorities have eventually understood that people are really disappointed and if they try to keep the power during the next elections, they may fail as people will flip out. These three years and next year will show that the government is failing. In fact this government is the worst government in the modern history of Armenia. There are no results and they are even stepping back. The level of poverty, foreign debt and inflation has grown. We are stagnating in all directions. Currently the level of GDP is very low compared to 2008. But the authorities unfortunately are not making drastic reforms, which is the only way to solution, but are involved in PR and they try to help the financial situation of people by subsidizing. This will break the balance in the economy and after the next elections, whoever takes the power, will have more difficulties to solve those problems. We will have to take new borrowings, thus destabilizing the macroeconomic situation. Democracy is fake in our country as the principles of democracy such as tolerance, rule of law, freedoms and free elections do not work in Armenia. The three main principles of the market such as equal conditions, competition and immunity of property are imbalanced.
– You are criticizing the government, which is mostly composed of the same people who used to occupy high positions during your tenure as well. Why do you think they do not work effectively anymore?
– Yes, all of them used to be my colleagues. I don’t know why their team work is not success and is not effective. The official statistics shows that there is no result. The government’s problem is the lack of creative policy and they do not have skills of economic forecast. Let’s remember the promises in 2008 and the situation we have now. I think that the society has fully lost the credibility to the government. At least the society should be optimistic and with that encourage the development of the economy, but when the society and producers do not have that credibility to the government, even the best promises cannot encourage the economic development. I think that the president has a serious problem to think about serious changes in the government to be able to go out of this situation.
– Do you mean the replacement of the prime-minister?
– As I am not a member of the government I do not have the right to say who to keep or who to replace, but it is a fact that there are many problems in the government.
– Have you taken into consideration in your critics the fact that there was economic crisis in the world during the past three years and it had its impact on the processes in Armenia?
– It would be wrong to say that the 15% economic slump in 2009 was a result of the crisis. There were three main factors for that huge slump. The first problem was the economic crisis, the second one was the institutional and structure shortcomings of the economy, and the third problem is the policy of the government. We did not have tools to control the first one, but the other two factors were in our hands. The government failed to make structural changes or take necessary steps. I would say all these three factors were equal in the economic slump. I think that if we could make drastic reforms and implement the right policy, the slump would not be 15 but 4-5%. We were in the second last place in the world with these efforts. In these conditions of inflation the main solution is the exclusion of monopolies, which the government fails to do now because the business and government are so interconnected that the government simply cannot do that as they have mutual interests. In twenty years since the independence we know what the problems of Armenia are and we simply need to be brave enough and have political will to solve those problems. There are 6-7 urgent steps to be taken, and I believe that if the president manages to do that, the situation and quality of life in the country will be different till the parliamentary elections.
– What are those steps?
– First, the president should make a speech and announce that he guarantees free and fair elections. Second, he should from now on as practical actions he should enable all political parties participate in elections and campaign independently on equal rights to establish the political counter-balance. 3. Third, all political prisoners must be set free immediately. This will be the most important action to cure the wounds of March 1. The wounds will not be cured but there will be less pain. 4. They should not put limitations on electronic media and should let the public demand make their programs. 5. Guarantee all freedoms established by the Constitution. 6. They must not use the state institutions such as the tax department, police and judicial system as a tool of influence on people. 7. They must tax all companies without any exception and also fight out monopolies. If there are certain types of products that need monopoly from the prospective of national security, they can leave these monopolies. This should not be monopolies of individuals so that the state takes money from those individuals to keep the army, but these should be state monopolies. For doing these things they don’t need to change the law and establish commissions. The only thing they will have to do is application of the requirements of the Constitution. All these things are about one person. If the president decides to do these things before the upcoming parliamentary elections, I am sure that Armenia and the quality of life in this country will be totally different before the elections.
– The monopolies and all shortcomings you said originated and strengthened during the tenure of the previous authorities.
– It does not matter when it was originated; it does not justify anything. Twenty years have passed since the independence, if there was such thing before, we have to change it now. However there were many good things too before which do not exist now.
– Before saying these things you blamed the government of ineffective work but now you are saying that it is about the wish of the president only. What you said means that the reason why the government is not effective is not their bad work but the president’s failure.
– Of course all these things are interconnected. There are problems that need the president’s solution, but there are problems that are a result of ineffective work of the government.
– The society is demanding those changes too, but if the authorities do that, it will end their tenure.
– I don’t think so. I think the reputation of the authorities will grow and the possibility of being elected through fair elections will be higher.
– Thousands of people attend the rallies of the opposition. What is the reason so many people are interested in those rallies?
– It is about complaints of people. In Armenia only those people are satisfied with the situation who are close to the authorities; all the other people are complaining. Every day I talk to many people in the foundation, and all of them want change. This change cannot be late. In order to escape from the shocks that happened in the Arabic world the authorities should make changes themselves rather than wait until people will make them do those changes.
– Is the influence of the turbulence of the Arabic world large on Armenia?
– The same diagnoses exist in Armenia in different depths. The difference is that things are pretty unpredictable here. If the elections proceed with the same falsifications and people really feel the momentum of change it will happen here too.
– The discontent people have expectations from the opposition. Do you think the actions of the people fit the expectations of the people?
– At this moment it is hard for me to pay compliments to the opposition because the situation is pretty specific here and each representative of the opposition bloc is trying to strengthening their own positions. And if you are in the stage of positioning it is hard to state whether this is the ultimate policy of the opposition or they are still going to take adequate steps to meet the demands of the people.
– What is the possibility of extraordinary elections?
– I have never believed in the possibility of by-elections and I never welcomed those attempts. I think we will once again step into the phase of ordinary elections. So it’s worth preparing well for them. During this period if the public demand is high the government will consider those and will have to hold more or less fair elections. The people will urge the government take concrete steps.
P.S. Please read the next part of Vartan Oskanyan’s interview about NKR in our next edition.