According to our information from the Armenian revolutionary Federation (ARF), the political board of the party is discussing the issue of resigning from the coalition after the May 31 mayoral elections in Yerevan. Certainly it has been the strategy of the ARF to pretend being an opposition power and threatening to resign from the coalition before elections, which was done only for the purpose of getting a couple of positions of ministers and governors. However this time the situation seems to be more serious and they are discussing not only the issue of resigning from the coalition, but the issue of making a new cooperation format with Heritage party as well (including the possibility of making a joint faction in the parliament). This “project” seems to be realistic because the leader of the Heritage party has contacts with the same Diaspora institutions as the ARF. As for the ARF, they are not keen to such cooperation of a new format but our sources say that since the recent activation of the Armenian-Turkish relationships the Diaspora institutions have demanded from the ARF to be separated from the incumbent government. Definitely this is the reason why recently the ARF made several announcements saying that it is not excluded that the ARF may collaborate with other political powers after the mayoral elections. Artsvik Minasyan, who is the first candidate in the community council members’ pre-election list of the ARF, recently said that it is not excluded that their party might cooperate with the Armenian National Congress as well. Certainly it does not mean that this is the way it should be. It is not excluded at all that after accomplishing the show of developing the Armenian-Turkish relations (if it happens before May 31) the ARF may give up and get new positions of ministers and governors again and support the “stability” in the country till the next elections.
