A series of Armenian opposition parties have given consent to take part in the 2008 presidential elections with one candidate, and there is a tendency of more parties joining.
Artashes Geghamyan’s “National Unity” political party has joined the “Alternative” NGO’s political initiative, along with the conservative “Democratic Homeland”, “Republic”, and People’s Party of Armenia. It is noteworthy that Geghamyan has shown no signs of his existence after May 12 (we had already started to miss him). Strangely, “Alternative” and “Republic”, whose representatives announce that they are going to be very careful when it comes time to selecting colleagues, also choose Geghamyan as their colleague, for giving his consent to the one candidate principle. This is the same Geghamyan who, according to them, “turned his back” on the oppositionists during the crucial moments of the campaign, helped the authorities implement their programs, and “earned” the reputation of being a “mine” installed in the opposition field, acting as an “oppositionist”. Perhaps in this case we are going with the logic that after being “cheated and tossed to the side” by the authorities on May 12, Geghamyan can now be considered trustworthy. Being in favor of the “one united candidate”, Geghamyan is perhaps trying to “stay on top of things” after May 12. However, there can be no doubt that if the “one united candidate” really begins to present a danger to the authorities, they will try to weaken the candidate in the way they know best, split, “ruin” that union, and perhaps in the end Aram Z. Sargsyan will again be forced to propose to Geghamyan to “flip a coin”.
In any case, talks on coming up with one candidate for the upcoming presidential elections are still going on among some political parties. However, there are parties with which there is nothing to negotiate. This refers to the “New Times” party, headed by Aram Karapetyan. “New Times” has announced several times that it will participate with its own candidate in the upcoming presidential elections (obviously, that candidate is Aram Karapetyan), but a couple of weeks ago the political party dispersed an announcement, according to which “New Times” is going to participate in the presidential elections with an “exclusive party candidate”. In fact, members of “New Times” are against the centralization (polarization) of the opposition. They believe that many candidates must participate in the presidential election and in the second stage (Karapetyan is certain that there will be a second stage) it will be clear as to who the one candidate of the opposition is. We tried to find out from “New Times” whether they will give their consent to the “united candidate” idea or join only under the condition of having Karapetyan as the one candidate. It turned out Karapetyan, as it happens very often, has left for Moscow, and will be back in late August. “New Times” press correspondent Emanuel Margaryan told “168 Hours” that if talks go on between “New Times” and other parties upon Karapetyan’s return, then “New Times” will disperse an announcement about that. But Margaryan found it necessary to mention that the announcement of the party to participate with an “exclusive party candidate” is still in effect. In fact, it is quite possible that the “New Times” candidate, Aram Karapetyan, will not register as an Armenian presidential candidate, because he may face problems with RA legislation. Let us recall that in 2003, the Central Electoral Commission first registered presidential candidate Aram Karapetyan and with that accepted that he, among other requirements, fulfills the requirement of having permanently lived in the Republic of Armenia for the past ten years. However, after a couple of months, it turned out that the same person who had permanently lived in Armenia for the past ten years had not lived in Armenia for the past five years (which is required in order to be registered as a deputy candidate), and the Central Electoral Commission had not registered Karapetyan as a deputy candidate. The Central Electoral Commission explained this nonsense with a new fact (the commission had encountered a document that proves that Karapetyan had not lived in Armenia the five years previous to 2003). So, if four years ago Karapetyan had not permanently lived in Armenia for the five years before that, then he doesn’t fulfill the requirement of having permanently lived in Armenia for the last 10 years to be registered as an Armenian presidential candidate. But even if they don’t register Karapetyan, we surely won’t have a lack of presidential candidates. Perhaps the most interesting thing is to see who the “united candidate” is going to be. Those united under the “one united candidate” idea aren’t mentioning anything. Unlike us, the press of the “outpost owner” Russia has touched upon this topic a lot recently. A couple of days ago, the Russian “Nezavisimaya Gazeta” wrote that that candidate could be first president of the Republic of Armenia, Levon Ter-Petrosyan. On the same day, the Russian informational/analytical periodical “segodnia.ru” referred to this topic as well. The article was entitled “Levon Ter-Petrosyan: prophecy becoming reality”.
“It is evident that all of the predictions of former president Levon Ter-Petrosyan are coming true. It is known that his conference dedicated to the courses to take for the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and his article “War or Peace” followed his resignation. Ter-Petrosyan thought that the side with stronger positions will benefit from compromise. Today, the situation is much worse as we approach the 10-year presidential term of Robert Kocharyan, from Karabakh, who came to power thanks to his uncompromising position on the Nagorno-Karabakh issue,” says the columnist and continues: “If in 1993 Armenia, Azerbaijan and the OSCE Minsk Group were asking Stepanakert to participate in the negotiations, today Karabakh is making useless efforts to participate in the negotiations. The “package version” proposition was removed from the negotiation terminology because it became clear that such a version was not going to be discussed at all. The international community accepted new anti-Armenian documents and resolutions (for example, the State Department Report, and Council of Europe observer Atkinson’s report on Armenia)”. The “segodnia.ru” also states: “Today Yerevan is ready to give up the territories in exchange for a referendum. On the other hand, the possibility of a military attack by Azerbaijan is growing.”