Armenian contemporary singers announced once again that they support the Republicans and are ready, true, with honoraria, to travel from village to village and steer the Armenian villagers towards the Republican Party. Another group of young singers is getting ready to do the same thing for the “Prosperous Armenia” party. Arto Tunjboyadjyan has already shown his support through his songs for the “Heritage” party and the ARF. Songwriter Ruben Hakhverdyan dedicated another one of his songs to the ARF.
In European countries, the concerts, song, and dance of contemporary artists are something of the past because similar events, as a rule, don’t add to the number of sympathizers of the parties. Secondly, does the group of young singers ready to spread the word of the ruling party with honoraria actually think that it has the weight and the reputation to be able to steer anyone towards this or that political party? There is only one answer to the question as to why people in Armenia apply the retro methods of pre-election campaign and spend tons of money on that-by doing this, the results of the elections are legalized.
Since Armenians have been seeing the same faces in the political field for the past two decades, it is rare to find one person in Armenia who doesn’t have his or her political preferences. Thus, it is not that easy to imagine Christine Pepelyan or Arminka able to make somebody the sympathizer of a political party just because they are ready to sing and dance when that political party says to do so. In that sense, Ruben Hakhverdyan has worn out.
Director of the Caucasian Institute of Press Alexander Iskandaryan believes that the number of sympathizers of a given political party don’t increase by the party’s organized concerts.
“Surveys in Armenia indicate that especially in the Marzes, the person with the highest rating is neighbor Onik-‘we will do whatever Onik tells us to do’. Perhaps similar concerts would have an impact on those who are not informed and don’t know the politicians and/or parties in the field, but it seems as though there is no such thing today. In my opinion, they can have an impact on the villagers only through the means of the village heads and the local authorities.”
Of course, it has never been hard for the worry-free singers with no political orientation to choose which party to sing for, except this year when they were faced with choosing between two parties. However, that difficult choice is also in the past, and all that is left to do is to open and close the mouth as their recording is played.
During an interview, head of the State Theatre of Song Arthur Grigoryan told “168 Hours” that there is nothing wrong when singers want to earn some money every four years.
“What can make singers sing for the advertisements of two political parties at the same time? Everyone knows the answer to that-money.”
If scientists really conducted research on political advertisements in Armenia and their impact, we suppose that there would be only one conclusion-political advertisements have little impact on us Armenian voters. At a time when presidential candidate Robert Kocharyan was asked why his pre-election billboards were so small, Kocharyan replied that the existing president’s pre-election campaign billboards must differ from the cigarette-advertising billboards. It is understandable that in the case of Robert Kocharyan, the size of the billboards was a matter of taste and modesty. He simply understood very well that even if something has an impact on the elections, it is definitely not the size of the billboards. The photographs and exclamations seen up close that everything is being done for Armenia, the assurances of old friendship even become the reason for bitter conclusions and don’t help form the respect towards the men at the age of Balzac smiling in the photographs. Any Armenian familiar with the nuances of Armenia’s national policy knows that the electorate listens to the political advertisements broadcast on television (if it does not have concrete revelations such as, let’s say, the speeches made by leader of “New Times” political party Aram Karapetyan) merely with the same interest as they would watching sports. There are two exclusive election tools that justify themselves in Armenia-electoral fraud and voter bribe and the love confessions of chess players, weightlifters or entertainers for this or that political party simply creates the lyrical background.