Since the estrangement of Armenian Diasporans is becoming more and more inevitable during the times of globalization, it is better to “have the Diaspora become more involved in strengthening the Homeland, thus postpone its estrangement.”
This is just one of the opinions expressed in the book entitled “Towards Ararat: National Repatriation Project-the key for Armenia’s development”. The book was published by the “Yerkir” repatriation and unity union. Just recently, head of the union Sevak Artsruni and director of the “Noravank” scientific/educational center Gagik Harutyunyan held a discussion dedicated to issues concerning repatriation.
The goal of the debaters was the same: to create conditions for Armenians living abroad to repatriate to Armenia.
The new Constitution of Armenia allows the Armenian to be a citizen of Armenia and another country, but the “law on dual citizenship” still hasn’t been passed and Armenians from abroad are in a state of uncertainty.
“I am forced to register my children studying in Armenia’s universities at the Ministry of Internal Affairs each year,” said repatriate Sevak Artsruni.
Sometimes, you don’t know whether to laugh or cry about some issues. For example, Vigen Arabyan, who used to live in Los Angeles, returned to Armenia a year ago with the purpose of settling down. He had problems from the start. The customs department delayed the arrival of his personal items.
The debaters of the conference even came up with their plan of the “Repatriation law” which, according to them, has been approved by parliamentarians.
Of course, there can be no criticism. But when you take a look at the social/economic, political and demographic status of the country, you begin to doubt the effectiveness of any repatriation project.
If you remember, the people in favor of the constitutional amendments claimed that one of the main arguments for passing the amendments was to let our compatriots living abroad become citizens of Armenia. In other words, you got the impression that the Armenians living in the Diaspora have a strong desire to become citizens of Armenia and the Armenian government is prohibiting that with the constitutional clause stating the ban on dual citizenship. The amendments passed, the clause was taken out and the number of citizens will rise after the law is passed on the account of Armenian Diasporans. One of the obstacles standing in the way is that the countries with the most Armenian citizens-the U.S. and Russia-prohibit dual citizenship. In other words, Armenians who are citizens of those two countries must give up the given country’s citizenship in order to become citizens of Armenia. It’s interesting: for what?
Why should the Armenian living abroad, who is not rich, but has a high-paying job and whose rights are defended, suddenly come to Armenia, where he will be in a state of uncertainty and where his rights are not defended. Is the feeling of patriotism enough for repatriation?
V. Arabyan tried answering to that question. His reply wasn’t really an answer, but rather a desire-you need the patriotic idealism, but also a sense of being protected. But Armenian citizens are the first who need that feeling of protection. One of the journalists present asked about emigration, but V. Arabyan said that “that’s not a topic on the agenda today”. After a while, he clarified the “topic”.
“We say that we must have 4 million people living in Armenia.”
The entire image is pretty interesting: on the one hand, it seems as though something is being done to make Armenians leave Armenia, on the other hand, they are trying to make the Armenian Diasporans used to the good life come back to Armenia. That’s not that easy. According to G. Harutyunyan, the hardships that repatriate Armenians face in Armenia serve as anti-propaganda for the others. But isn’t it anti-propaganda to have thousands of Armenians, including intellectuals, leave Armenia or ready to leave at any moment?
Question: if the government isn’t able to protect its citizens, both socially and legally, how is it going to protect the others? It’s kind of hard to agree with G. Harutyunyan when he says that it’s the right time to implement the repatriation project. Imagine: the law will soon be passed. How is the state going to guarantee the fulfillment of, let’s say, article 9.4 of the Constitution: “If the person wishing to repatriate has problems with finding a home…he/she will be provided with a list of residential areas where homes are free.”
It turns out that Armenian citizens will no longer have communal problems and now we can move on to the repatriates. Of course, that would be great, but we are simply kidding ourselves.
As we look at the constructed elite buildings and the ones in the process of construction, we come to a sad conclusion: we are exchanging our needy and vulnerable citizens with a richer level of society based on the standards of the Northern Avenue construction. Not bad…
What’s also interesting is the point in the bill, which states: “… only repatriates can have the opportunity to be granted Armenian citizenship”. As if people really wanted to become citizens of Armenia, now they are simply making it a little harder. According to Mr. Artsruni, the “dual citizenship” bill presented by the ARF was a nice surprise because “it doesn’t contradict their draft”. The most important point on which they agree with the ARF is that only permanent citizens of Armenia should have the right to vote and be elected. It is worth mentioning that Artsruni is a “former Dashnak (federalist) [although they say that there is no such thing].
In fact, let’s not forget to mention that V. Arabyan hoped that despite the hardships, the repatriation project will be successful and that “the bad customs of the Soviet era will one day disappear”. For example, he gets out of his apartment every morning, says hello to the guard and thus adds positive changes to Armenian life. We didn’t know that saying hello to the guard “during the Soviet era” was dishonorable…
Everyone knows that Americans especially like to smile for no reason and say “How are you?” instead of hello and don’t really care what you’ll say. Perhaps we Armenians are more gloomy, don’t like to smile, but we are probably more honest and heartfelt for one another. Perhaps it would be better to keep our human relations at the same “retarded” pace, just like “during the Soviet era”…