In one of his articles, political scientist Igor Muradyan named the former NKR NSS chairman, Bako Sahakyan, a “professional drug-addict” and an “unprofessional” KGB agent. The latter has resigned his position so he could run in the presidential elections. Do the voters of Karabakh know about that? The voters who, according to sociologist Aharon Adibekyan, find Bako Sahakyan the kindest, the most humane candidate? As a response to this question Adibekyan, who is now conducting polls in Karabakh, said, “The mistakes of youth cannot pursue the person for the rest of his life. We have 700 questionnaires and people haven’t written anything about these things. If there was such a thing, Bako Sahakyan’s “haters” would definitely write about that. Karabakh is so small that it’s impossible to hide anything there. People complain that they cannot even go to the “left” (cheat on one’s spouse).
“In the presidential elections of Karabakh, Bako Sahakyan’s candidacy has the greatest chance for victory,” sociologist Aharon Adibekyan stated when meeting journalists. “Only Masis Mailyan can compete with him. The chances of the other candidates are quite slim.”
Aharon Adibekyan, the embodiment of independent sociology, visited Karabakh at the invitation of the youth wing of the Union of Azatamartiks and conducted a poll to find out the popular rating of the five candidates running in the presidential election of July 19. Aharon Adibekyan did not charge a fee for the poll; they only covered travel expenses and other technical expenses. According to Adibekyan, he did not get an order from any of the candidates. In other words, free sociology is not only in a trap like cheese, but also at the Sociometer. Aharon Adibekyan presented the results of his move, made out of good faith, to help promote the democracy of the Karabakh presidential election to Armenian reporters on June 18 at the Friday Club. His study showed that the likely winner is the so-called “single candidate” Bako Sahakyan. “Sahakyan is likely to win, Masis Mayilyan can compete with him, and the others are given low ratings,” Adibekyan says, presenting the results of the poll taken among 1,000 respondents. By the way, 300 declined to answer the questions. Adibekyan thinks they will not vote. Mayilyan’s average popular rating is about 6 percent, while Sahakyan’s is four times higher. Instead, fewer people are against Mayilyan becoming president. More people, about 1.5 percent, do not want Sahakyan to become president. He says the deputy foreign minister, Mayilyan, has a high popular rating in Stepanakert, about 10 percent. Meanwhile, in the regions people do not know him. However, this is only the beginning, and the candidates still have to meet with people and fight for 55 percent of the votes, which do not belong to anyone yet. In other words, according to Adibekyan, everything depends on how aware the candidates are of the wishes and expectations of voters. Besides, well-off and educated people mainly support Mayilyan, because Mayilyan is ahead of Sahakyan in intelligence. However, social and economic problems are important to people, the pollster says. According to him, the respondents appreciate kindness, care, a willingness to think about people, education, literacy, intelligence, experience and skills in a leader. According to Adibekyan, Mayilyan is ahead of Sahakyan on two parameters – literacy and education. He is behind on all the other parameters. “In terms of education, he is ahead of Bako, because he studied at the diplomatic academy of Vienna. It is a great factor, if he makes use of it. But among whom? Among educated, intelligent voters, whose ratio is small, you see. This is the problem,” Adibekyan says. According to him, common farmers do not want a “glamorous” candidate but want a “daddy”. Adibekyan says, in fact, Karabakh is going to choose between “glamour” and “daddy”. Bako Sahakyan will be the daddy, who has such an image among people because he has provided money and other aid to many people. In answer to the question of Lragir.am if the people of Karabakh think Bako Sahakyan helped people from his own pocket, Adibekyan says he does not know, that he only supposes that he helped people when he occupied different posts. In this case we asked what made him think so. “People who answered said that he helps people. I do not know why he helps. He may make a phone call to the judge, the prosecutor; he used to work in the sphere of home affairs. He helped people,” Adibekyan says. In fact, Adibekyan exposes cases of corruption when the head of the National Security Service of Karabakh calls the judge, the prosecutor and solves certain problems. “Everything is possible because there is a problem of justice,” Aaron Adibekyan says. He actually considers his survey unnecessary because in a country where problems of justice are solved through phone calls among high-ranking officials, no doubt the same phone calls will be used in the presidential election to provide justice. Thus everything is still to come. And sociological polls make up part of the PR campaign of the candidates. Perhaps that’s the reason the candidates often “order” polling results. But let’s remind that the sociologists only predict but do not “approve”.