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Today's Zaman, Turkey
Feb 16 2013
Election fraud claims run high as Armenians prepare to vote
15 February 2013 /MUSTAFA EDİB YILMAZ, YEREVAN
It's a once-in-a-five-year choice the Armenians can make, yet few here
seem to be excited, with the presidential election ballot box
appearing in only two days' time. The reason? Because it's like
watching a movie after having been reminded too often about how it
ends.
So the news on President Serzh Sarksyan's highly expected victory
following Monday's polls will not be surprising at all. For Alexander
Iskandaryan, director of the Yerevan-based Caucasus Institute, "the
race was over in December" when wealthy businessman Gagik Tsarukyan of
the Prosperous Armenia Party ` which captured nearly 30 percent of the
vote in the May 2012 parliamentary elections against Sarksyan's
Republican Party of Armenia's 53 percent -- decided not to run in the
elections.
However, there are still candidates who would challenge the president
at the ballot box. Six candidates to be exact, yet in Iskandaryan's
words "they could only be rivals to each other, not to Sarksyan." In
an apparent indication of the kind of frustration people were feeling,
Andrias Ghukasyan -- a political analyst who also happened to be one
of those candidates -- has been on a hunger strike since Jan.21,
demanding "the fake elections be stopped."
Another candidate, Raffi Hovannisian, who, according to almost all
opinion polls one might come across, stands the biggest chance of
replacing the current president for the next five years, explains that
Armenians have not experienced "free and fair" elections since their
country's independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. Indeed, he said,
speaking to a group of Turkish journalists Thursday night, they have
not seen any since the first presidential elections that brought Ter
Petrosyan to power, under whom Hovannisian served as the first foreign
minister of the country.
According to Hovannisian, hundreds of public buildings -- among them
schools and hospitals -- were used for Sarksyan's propaganda, one
piece of information he said his campaign has documented to relevant
election observers. He went on to claim that civil servants and
military conscripts were too often pressured to vote in a particular
way by the government in the landlocked Caucasian country, adding that
Sarksyan, however, on a number of occasions made clear that he would
do everything to ensure elections are properly held. "We applaud the
president for those remarks and will hold him to his promises," he
said. When asked what his reaction will be if he finds out that
Monday's election is no exception to the Armenians' bitter experience
for years now, he said, "I will tell you that on Tuesday."
Sarksyan won the previous presidential elections in 2008 in the first
round with nearly 53 percent of the vote against Petrosyan's 21.5
percent, a result the latter strongly disputed with allegations of
fraud. The 2012 general elections were marred by similar accusations
towards the government, whose results were recognized by none of the
four opposition parties represented in Parliament.
Feb 16 2013
Election fraud claims run high as Armenians prepare to vote
15 February 2013 /MUSTAFA EDİB YILMAZ, YEREVAN
It's a once-in-a-five-year choice the Armenians can make, yet few here
seem to be excited, with the presidential election ballot box
appearing in only two days' time. The reason? Because it's like
watching a movie after having been reminded too often about how it
ends.
So the news on President Serzh Sarksyan's highly expected victory
following Monday's polls will not be surprising at all. For Alexander
Iskandaryan, director of the Yerevan-based Caucasus Institute, "the
race was over in December" when wealthy businessman Gagik Tsarukyan of
the Prosperous Armenia Party ` which captured nearly 30 percent of the
vote in the May 2012 parliamentary elections against Sarksyan's
Republican Party of Armenia's 53 percent -- decided not to run in the
elections.
However, there are still candidates who would challenge the president
at the ballot box. Six candidates to be exact, yet in Iskandaryan's
words "they could only be rivals to each other, not to Sarksyan." In
an apparent indication of the kind of frustration people were feeling,
Andrias Ghukasyan -- a political analyst who also happened to be one
of those candidates -- has been on a hunger strike since Jan.21,
demanding "the fake elections be stopped."
Another candidate, Raffi Hovannisian, who, according to almost all
opinion polls one might come across, stands the biggest chance of
replacing the current president for the next five years, explains that
Armenians have not experienced "free and fair" elections since their
country's independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. Indeed, he said,
speaking to a group of Turkish journalists Thursday night, they have
not seen any since the first presidential elections that brought Ter
Petrosyan to power, under whom Hovannisian served as the first foreign
minister of the country.
According to Hovannisian, hundreds of public buildings -- among them
schools and hospitals -- were used for Sarksyan's propaganda, one
piece of information he said his campaign has documented to relevant
election observers. He went on to claim that civil servants and
military conscripts were too often pressured to vote in a particular
way by the government in the landlocked Caucasian country, adding that
Sarksyan, however, on a number of occasions made clear that he would
do everything to ensure elections are properly held. "We applaud the
president for those remarks and will hold him to his promises," he
said. When asked what his reaction will be if he finds out that
Monday's election is no exception to the Armenians' bitter experience
for years now, he said, "I will tell you that on Tuesday."
Sarksyan won the previous presidential elections in 2008 in the first
round with nearly 53 percent of the vote against Petrosyan's 21.5
percent, a result the latter strongly disputed with allegations of
fraud. The 2012 general elections were marred by similar accusations
towards the government, whose results were recognized by none of the
four opposition parties represented in Parliament.