Referendum-politics for everyone

26/10/2005 Lilit SEYRANYAN

– Do you agree with the announcements of ruling political parties and state officers that oppositionists in fact realize that there are a lot of positive changes in the    Constitution Draft and they shouldn’t use this very important referendum as a good chance for them to reach their goals and interests?

– First of all I’d like to say that I am glad that they understand that the Constitution is very important. But before saying these kinds of things first of all they must follow the Constitution, not violate the law. They must apologize to the society for the violations they have made. And after this if the society forgives them, they will have a “moral right” to organize a new Constitutional referendum. Now when they petition everyone not to violate the law, but they violate the law themselves, they have no right to organize something  like this. A person, who has always violated the law, doesn’t have “a moral right” to bring up a new law.

– MP and member of “Republican Party” Samvel Nikoyan petitioned oppositionists to follow Paruyr Hairikyan, who had always criticized the authorities, but at last left his ambitions and petitioned his followers to vote for the Constitution. Are you going to follow Paruyr Hairikyan and do like he did?

– A member of “RP”, who petitions to call for the Constitution, can do this. I have my own approach to the referendum, and I am not going to vote for it. But if they are legitimate, they’d better create equal conditions for all. This is the meaning of democratic referendum. You can’t say that there is democracy only by petitioning people to vote for the Constitution. I hope they are honest when saying that that this draft is good. I think this draft is not good, because it is very important for me who the author is. But if they violate the law and do whatever they want, we will never agree with them. For instance, they attached three big posters on the front wall of the National Academy of Science and wrote “yes” on them. So why don’t they let us, for example, attach our own posters on the front wall of the State University building and write “no”? In this case I would appreciate for them to create equal conditions for everyone. If our followers represent a  minority, I will understand this. Even the ambassador of the US said that if the referendum was violated, people would have a right to protect their interests on streets. If they violate the referendum, they will have to leave and we will take the appropriate actions to organize a revolution for sure. This is the problem that we are going to solve.

– The head of “Nig Aparan” Patriotic Alliance, the general prosecutor of Armenia Aghvan Hovsepyan once said that you petitioned your followers not to vote for the Constitution because you were not the ruling party, but if you were the ruling party, you would petition them to vote for it. He also said that no one could say when you were going to be the ruling power in order to adopt this Constitution.

– The opposition will come to power very soon. And I am sure that the general prosecutor first of all will not have the right to spread propaganda, because it is prohibited by the law, and also he will not be able to vote based on his status.

– What do you mean by that?

– There is a category of people in jurisprudence who are not eligible for voting.

– The head of “National Unity” party Artashes Geghamyan is going to make a suggestion to the authorities during the meeting of their party, by petitioning people to vote for the Constitution if the authorities agree to dissolve the National Assembly after the referendum. What would you say about this and do you agree with him?

– This is strange to me. As far as I know A.Geghamyan wasn’t intended to vote for the Constitution. I have my own approach and I think we shouldn’t try to come to an arrangement with the authorities, much less when it has to do with the Constitution. Besides that, this referendum will give a chance to make a political choice. Those people who think that the reason for our losses is this document, follow the authorities. Those people, who think that they can change something in our country by changing the Constitution, follow the authorities too because this document is not even a document in our country, this is just a piece of paper which has always been violated by the authorities. And those people who don’t think so, will follow the opposition, will not vote for the Constitution and will do their work on streets. I will not be amazed if some parties go along with the authorities when making their political choice. This is not excluded in Armenia, this has happened before. As for Artashes Geghamyan, he didn’t intend to vote for the Constitution, and I think he must go on till the end. If he offers us something like this, we will tell him what our approach is. We will go till the end and will not vote for the Constitution.

– Do you think the fact that Artashes Geghamyan and Shavarsh Kocharyan were included in the delegation visiting the EU and also agree that there are positive changes in the Constitutional Draft is by chance?

– I believe that this is by chance. I don’t want to have any conflicts with them. They have their own opinions, and I believe that they are honest when expressing them. I think that all the opposition parties that participated in this process, have already understood that deals, documents are not important in this country because the moral environment has collapsed here. We mustn’t let it go on like this; we must have another Armenia in 2007.