Stepan Zoryan wrote a small talk entitled “Tigran from Zangezur”. One day “bolshevik” Tigran was standing in their balcony and saw an archbishop walking in the street crowded by people. He didn’t like that “appearance”, went down from the balcony and hit the archbishop. “His hat flew away when I hit him”, says Tigran and complains that after he had hit the archbishop some “bolsheviks” attacked him and tried to terror him. It is clear that the young “bolshevik” had not been instructed to do that and it was his own decision to hit the archbishop. However, the “bolsheviks” had created an environment, in which every normal young man would do like Tigran did.
RA former prime minister and former defense minister Vazgen Manukyan was refused to be given a hotel room in Syunik region. They can bring arguments and try to explain that decision, but the fact is that they didn’t give a room. In addition, they don’t allow the opposition to organize rallies in the Republic square either. These are different rings of the same chain. It is clear that in both cases they were instructed to do that, but this is not the problem. The problem is that if even they were not instructed to do that, the governors of Yerevan and Goris city would again refuse to give them rooms in order to show to their chiefs that they are doing as they would like them to do. This is a consequence of the environment that exists in the country. State officials don’t act basing on the law, but act so that their chiefs like them; businessmen act not according to the rules of business, but so that they can keep good relations with the government… As a result of creating this environment our society has frightened businessmen, officials, frightened intelligentsia… By the way, it did not matter what the opposition was going to campaign in the Freedom square or what Vazgen Manukyan was going to say in Syunik. The problem is that the authorities have pressed on the society (especially in villages) up to slavery “in favor of stability in the country” (in fact in favor of keeping their power). At least, the difference between a state official and an appointed person is that officials serve the state, but appointed people serve their chiefs that have “given” them their positions.
This is a national security issue. It doesn’t make much difference whether Syunik has much strategic importance or not. All the regions of Armenia are in the same situation and all of them are equally important from the strategic point of view.
The problem is that “slaves” never fight against the foreign enemy. They may struggle a little bit to imitate that they are fighting, but not more. People fight against the foreign enemy for their freedom only in case they have it. This is the reason why in the history the Armenians did not struggle against the foreign enemy so well since they thought that they would have to pay the same taxes to the foreign enemies too as to their governors. This is the reason why the Ukrainians met the German fascists with bread and salt; they didn’t see anything else during the Soviet times than repression and exile. This is why the country where Sadam was elected by 99,8% public vote was conquered in two weeks.
The problem is very deep; Armenia is in a very difficult geopolitical situation and there may be a war any time. In order to protect the country people should have “something” to protect. This does not mean that otherwise they will welcome the enemy into their lands. They will not welcome, but neither will fight. They will just leave the country as they have done during many years.
As for the authorities, their main goal in this phase is providing the mentioned “99,8%”. For this purpose they are doing everything so that people feel like slaves on their own lands. Is it worth paying “so much” in favor of inner stability in case when it mostly depends on foreign factors and may disappear any time?