This autumn can be decisive for Armenia in connection with some things.
First of all, starting from the beginning of September the municipality
ellections start nearly in all the cities of the country. From this
point of view, the opposition follows a policy, which is out of the
political logics but still fully fits the opposition: the authorities
are spoiled in an extreme way and must be changed not from below, but
from above. I.e. the opposition makes its policy according to the
national saying, that “fish rot from the heads”, which is wise, but
meanwhile very simple. Of course, sometimes this saying is effective to
use for making something clear to the people. The fact, that the
opposition doesn’t take part in the municipality ellections because the
whole system has to be changed, is just justification for them, because
the authority starts from the municipal bodies. The top authorities are
to make decisions, and the municipalities are to make them come true.
Besides that, the authorities fulfil the function of connectiong the
society with the authorities, and people consider the authorities good
or bad first of all in the result of the municipal bodies work, because
the daily and usual problems of the society concern the municipalities.
Of course the role of the municipalities in the state political system
is not limited with this. As a lower level of the authorities, the
municipalities place a great role in forming the other authority
levels, i.e. in parliamentary and presidential ellections. And the
opinion, that the authorities want to see their “close people” as the
heads of the municipalities, is also a normal appearance. If we leave
everything personal aside and study this issue from he narrow political
point of view, we will see, that everyone having power wishes to fill
the other bodies with his close-minded people too. Though in Armenia
private factors place a bigger role, than the political ones. In other
words, anyway the opposition will nominate its some representatives in
some districts of Yerevan (For example DPA party intends to nominate
Ruzan Khachatryan, which, not depending on her possibilities, is a good
fact), but generally will stay out of the municipality ellections as
much as it can. And this policy can not be explained in any way.
The next more important event in autumn is the referendum of the
constitution reforms. After “chilling” for about two months, the
opposition at least decided, that not depending on what the
constitution reforms contain (not depending on whether it is positive
or negative), they will not take part in the reforms orgonozed by
unlegal authorities, even more, they will not call the public to call
“yes” for the constitution reforms. Especially in case when this
constitution can be used for nominating Robert Kocharyan for the third
time. And this collective decision to call “No” for the constutution
changes gives the opposition chances to pursue their goal: changing the
authority or making a revolution. I.e. the opposition now has a chance
to activate the public having exact time and activities calculations,
in order to excite the public during the referendum in autumn. And this
can be done by the opposition, as the people who like the law say,
according to the law. I.e. by having the constitution in their
activities basement and ideology, that they can obtain justice
constitutionally. At the same time, though the constitution reforms are
considered as the main agenda of our day, but the opposition can use
some daily problems with the opurpose of activating the public:
starting from the illegal constructions in the city centre and ending
up with the Karabakh conflict. And if the opposition this time asks the
people “to leave everything and go home in the middle of everything”,
and if the leaders of the opposition, in order to provide their own
security, leave the public under policemen cudgels, here we can already
forget about democracy and revolution in Armenia. Minimum till 2013.
And at least, in November, nearly in parralel with our
referendum, parliamentary ellections will take place in Azerbaijan,
which result may have serious influence on Armenia: both on the
Karabakh conflict negotiations and on the regional democracy reforms.
If today Georgia is considered as a “democratic island” in the region,
and it is not excluded, if after legal ellections the international
public will start to consider the regime of Aliev, which is
authoritarian, as democratic regime. In this case the possibility of
revolution in Armenia will be less for several times, because in order
to solve the Karabakh problem in favour of Azerbaijan, the
international institutions want Azerbaijan to have democratic, and
Armenia to have unlegal aithorities.
So, this autumn may be decisive both for Armenia and the political powers: for the opposition and for the authorities.
In connection with this, the autumn of 2005 can be the last autumn of the opposition.