Vartan Grigoryan, 25, lives in the Haterk village of the Martakert region of Karabakh and teaches math at the village school.
He knew about the Karabakh Constitution plan a long time ago by watching “HyeLur” (Armenian News) broadcasted on Armenian Public Television of Armenia. It’s impossible to watch the programs broadcasted on the Artsakh Public Television in the villages because the broadcast is not good. That’s the reason why a considerable part of villagers don’t know about the Constitution plan. Vartan says that he will vote “yes” during the referendum because “the Constitution is another important step for the stabilization of a newly independent country.”
“I’m trying to inform as much villagers as I can about the referendum and how important it is,” says Vartan.
Anush Sargsyan, 55, lives in one of the villages of the Martuni region. I met her at the Stepanakert market. When I asked her if she knew that there was going to be a Constitution Referendum in Karabagh on December 10, she said that she had heard about it from the market vendors, but “nobody can really say what that is and why we have to accept it.”
“My dear, I spend the whole day collecting greens in the fields. How should I know what that is? I still don’t know whether I will participate or not,” she said.
There are only a couple of days left until the Karabakh Constitution Referendum. Different organizations in Karabakh have conducted surveys to see just how well the people of Karabakh know the Constitution. Recently, the Artaskh Journalists’ Association also conducted such a survey.
There were 500 citizens of Karabakh participating in the survey, of which 150 were in Stepanakert, and 50 each from the Askeran, Martuni, Martakert, Shushi Hadrut, Kashatagh and Shahumyan regions (three ballots were considered invalid). Surveys show that 242 people know about the Constitution draft, 154 don’t know anything and 101 people know a little about it. “Will you participate in the referendum?” In response to this question, 431 people said yes, while 37 said no. Based on the results, 29 were undecided. Based on the abovementioned numbers, we can conclude that regardless of whether or not they know about the Constitution draft, the people said that they were ready to participate in the referendum.
What’s being done to spread the word about the Constitution? If we judge based on the survey results, we can say that not much is being done.
You don’t really feel that the people of the capital Stepanakert are ready for a referendum. There are only a couple of signs here and there. The Karabakh government is trying to spread the word with the help of some youth organizations that have decided to form some groups and travel around the regions with the purpose of explaining to the people how important it is to have a Constitution. The youth have broken up into three groups. The first meeting took place at the Artaskh State University, then the Chamber of Culture and Youth and the groups have been traveling around different residential areas since December 3. On the first day, the youth were able to visit nearly 10 residencies of the Martuni, Hadrut and Askeran regions. They plan on spreading the word until December 7.
It’s unclear as to whether or not the youth will be able to tour all the villages and how will they be able to “convince” the villagers, but one thing is clear: the Constitution will pass only if at least 30,000 participants out of the 60,000 mark “yes” on the ballot.”