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Number of Eligible Voters Increased While Armenia Population Dwindli

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  • Number of Eligible Voters Increased While Armenia Population Dwindli

    Number of Eligible Voters Increased While Armenia's Population Dwindling

    http://massispost.com/?p=5983
    Friday, March 30th, 2012

    YEREVAN - The number of eligible voters officially registered in
    Armenia has increased by nearly seven percent since the last national
    election four years ago, according to the voter lists updated ahead of
    the upcoming parliamentary polls.

    The voter rolls posted on the official websites of the Armenian Police
    and the Central Election Commission show that the number of people in
    Armenia allowed to vote in the May 6 elections is just over 2,485,000
    - an increase by more than 165,000 voters as compared to the official
    figure reported before the 2008 presidential election.

    Many believe that such a growth is impossible given the rate of
    emigration, as well as the preliminary data of the census taken last
    year, according to which Armenia's permanent population has dwindled
    by some 415,000 to around 2,870,000 over the 10-year period. They also
    challenge the assumption that only less than 400,000 people in the
    country are actually below Armenia's national voting age of 18.

    Meanwhile, head of the Passport and Visa Department of the Armenian
    Police Hovannes Kocharian dismissed the speculation about any kind of
    deliberate distortion of the electoral rolls to meet the interests of
    the ruling political force or any other groups. He explained the
    essential rise in the number of voters by a more meticulous
    registration of citizens in Armenia in the past four years.

    `A total of 359,614 voters, who weren't on the 2008 lists, have been
    added to the register by this year,' he said.
    By the time the Police in its statement published on Thursday insist
    that the assumptions about the figure's being exaggerated `do not
    correspond to reality,' information to the contrary had been posted on
    Facebook.

    Edgar Tamaryan, 25, a Facebook user, found his relatives - who in fact
    live in Georgia - included on the voter registration list as living in
    Yerevan.
    Further, more than 100 people were `registered' as living at that same address.

    Opposition groups have cast doubts over the veracity of the electoral
    rolls presented by the authorities. They again accuse the government
    of trying to rig the vote by inflating the official number of
    registered voters.

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