The Armenian opposition once again missed out on the opportunity to change power in the country. Now, as it gathers people at the “decisive”, “most decisive”, or “pan-Armenian”, but in reality the most typical meetings and then sending them home after a few hours, the opposition is only doing one thing: enlists more people who are disappointed and the voices fade away.
But as they say, there is still hope. With that hope, the opposition members have once again invited the people to another meeting. However, according to sources, this type of behavior shown by the opposition is a result of disagreements among members behind the curtain. The oppositionist leaders are contradicting each other about the steps to be taken for the “Orange Revolution”. As we all know, some of them are in favor of moving towards Baghramyan street and taking action there. Others are more for applying the ancient “constitutional” method. But secretary of the “Justice” alliance Victor Dallakyan does not agree that the opposition can not make a clear decision and that there are disagreements among members. “I consider the opinions claiming that the opposition can not make clear decisions as naïve. The opposition is not indecisive, but rather, it is in favor of thinking before taking action and not seeking adventures. We have no desire to kill Kocharyan. Whoever wants to do that, go ahead. The opposition must take political steps,” says Victor Dallakyan. According to Dallakyan, all opposition members agree that the present day authorities are dangerous for the road that Armenia needs to take for development and that they have freed themselves from the “criminal authorities”. “But there are oppositionist figures who have evidence to prove that the sooner they do away with the criminal authorities, the better it will be for the country. They are rushing because they are nationalistic and have plans for the country. But in that case they need the people’s help,” said the secretary of the “Justice” alliance as he tried to cover up the disagreements among opposition members. He believes that they have the people’s help. He also believes that the fact that many people boycotted the constitutional amendments referendum on November 27 says a lot. “Ninety percent of the people boycotted the referendum. Those people did not take part in the referendum, thus, they boycotted the existing criminal authorities. This means that at the present, the opposition has help from 90% of people,” says Victor Dallakyan. So, all the opposition has to do now is to wait for the right moment and do what they should have done a long time ago: change power. “Now is not the right time to go to Baghramyan street. If the authorities were not criminals, then the meetings, marches, demonstrations would be effective. But when you know that you are dealing with an armed gang of criminals and you take people to fight against that gang, those criminals are still going to apply force against the people. This is a venture and it is intolerable,” says Victor Dallakyan. “There were more people on April 12 of last year, but nobody could imagine that the authorities would turn the National Assembly into a center for bandits and those bandits would attack innocent demonstrators. I, as a human being, will not lead the people to be subjected to experiments.” Mr. Dallakyan reasons that the small number of people participating in the recent meetings is due to the fact that they are threatened. “If people know that they will not have any future problems by coming to the meetings, which is how it is in any civil country, 90% of the people will come. I am certain that the people who don’t come to the meetings are thinking about the meetings held at the Matenadaran.”
The people gathering at the meetings near the Matenadaran are demanding the opposition to take concrete steps. Mr. Dallakyan confesses that when he talks with people, “they tell us either death or freedom. They are ready for death, but political figures should not play with fire, but rather, they should explain to the people that they are dealing with criminals. We have to wait for the right moment. The sooner that moment comes, the better it will be for the country. But to go and take action without thinking beforehand, gather people and cause problems, I can not tolerate that. I think that we are treating the people fairly from that point of view,” says Dallakyan. The change of power in the country highly depends on the internal and foreign political processes. So, it turns out that as long as the “right moment” has not come, it is absurd to hold meetings. “If we had not responded to the humiliating results of the referendum, then we would ask ourselves why we did not protest. It is not absurd to hold meetings. A public meeting is a form of political struggle. However, I do agree that those meetings must be put to an end after a certain stage,” says Victor Dallakyan and as a historian, he tries to prove what he says by an example from history: “If humans went along with the thought of not fighting against something just because it is useless, then we would all be living in the period of slavery today. If Spartak were to go along with the thought that the Romans are strong and the country is big, then there would be no Italy today. This means that people must revolt and break into a riot. Nothing happens by chance.