Views from Moscow: New electoral cycle may result in sharp changes in political landscape in Armenia

The protests against the constitutional reforms in Armenia have revealed the key problems Armenia will face when entering the new electoral cycle, which may result in sharp changes in the political landscape, well-known Russian analyst Sergey Markedonov has told ArmInfo.    

According to the preliminary results of the Dec 6 constitutional referendum, 63.35% of the citizens voted for the constitutional amendments and 32.35% said "no" to the new constitution. 

"The social discontent and the authorities' striving for stabilization amid the need to aggravate the game to strengthen their own positions demonstrate that Armenia has entered a period of high-risk turbulence. In this light, it appears that the authorities' success in December will not be automatically put off till the electoral cycle of 2017 given the importance of the factor of personification in the post-Soviet countries," he says. 

Markedonov recalls that within four years following the 1 March tragedy, President Sargsyan managed to solve several political problems, particularly, to get out of Robert Kocharyan's shadow by building a vertical power structure around himself, as well as to switch to a dialogue with the opposition, quitting the direct pressure on the opposition and involving it in the political system. As a result, Heritage Party, Armenian National Congress Party, ARF Dashnaktsutyun Party and the Prosperous Armenia Party, which withdrew from the power coalition in 2012, received seats in the Parliament.        

However, the expert says, given the transformation of the stabilization task into an aim in itself, which does not imply active self-development of the political system, the discontent with the power has not disappeared all the same. The "old new power" has not only failed to settle a wide range of social problems, but also announced growth in electricity tariffs in June 2015. This has become the third tariff growth for the Armenian citizens over the past few years.     

The analyst points out that the Armenian leadership benefits from the lack of well-organized and attractive opposition, which was unable to head the social protest in summer-autumn and the protest against the referendum in winter 2015. He also points out the ideological indistinctness of those who criticize Sargsyan for authoritarianism and usurpation of power and at the same time reject the constitutional amendments aimed at creating a parliamentary model.  "It should be noted that the Karabakh conflict prevents the power and the opposition from taking sharp steps and the power undoubtedly benefits from that," Markedonov says.