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though it did note that the election was “characterized by intense polarization and marred by increasingly inflammatory rhetoric among key contestants.”
The Armenia alliance claimed that it had observed a large number of violations in favor of Civil Contract, and said that it did not accept the results. The big numbers for Pashinyan contradict “the results of polls, including international polls, as well as common sense,” the alliance said in a statement issued to local media as results were coming in. It did not give further indications about its next steps.
Kocharyan did not make any public comments as of late afternoon June
21, but speculation mounted that the Armenia and I Have Honor alliances may refuse to take up their mandates
in parliament. At a press conference, journalists asked the head of the Central Election Commission what would happen if the opposition parties refused
to take their seats. He suggested it would be uncharted territory: "At this stage,
we do not have a specified institution of renouncing the mandates,” he said.
But Manougian, the election expert, suggested that parliament could function normally with only Civil Contract MPs showing up, and that a similar situation prevailed for much of the post-war period, when the opposition parties often refused to attend sessions.
On election day, many Pashinyan critics appeared unwilling to go public with their vote and suggested a fear
of intimidation by the authorities.
“Pashinyan is a psychopath, incompetent, little man who gave 70 percent of our country away,” said one pensioner in Yerevan, referring to the loss in the war of formerly Armenian-controlled territory in and around Nagorno-Karabakh. “He shouldn’t be allowed to continue to
breathe but you will see how many votes he will get.” He asked not to be identified: “I don’t want to give my name, because
I voted for Kocharyan.”
“People don’t trust the current government, our borders aren’t secure,” said Liliana Grigoryan, a Russian teacher in Oshakan who declined to say who she voted for. “We came to vote but we don’t know if it will get any better.”
This piece has been updated to include updated results and comments from the Central Election Commission and the OSCE.
Joshua Kucera is the Turkey/Caucasus editor at Eurasianet, and author of
The Bug Pit. Ani Mejlumyan is a reporter based in Yerevan.
This article originally appeared on Eurasianet.
Nikol Pashinyan, Prime Minister of Armenia, votes in his polling station for the parliamentary elections of Armenia. Photograph: Celestino Arce Lavin/ZUMA Wire/REX/Shutterstock
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