The blogs are literally littered by politics these days, and while rare people like Artashes hope, that they are writing about Armenia’s First President Levon Ter-Petrossian and all this political stinking for the last time and calls it immoral to anyhow support the lawless and antinational Ter-Petrossian – Kocharian – Sargsyan continuous regime, the rest of the bloggers are blogging politics at length, and even enjoying it – it seems.
Following the publication of recent public opinion polls conducted by the british ComRes polling organization, which incited wide speculation in the blogosphere, with A1plus blog noting, that Gagik Tsarukyan, the richest businessman of Armenia and Tigran Karapetyan, owner of one of the most populist nationwide TV companies have identical rating, and asking the readers what they thought of the poll, only to receive a range of comments, all claiming, that the results of the poll are forged or somehow not valid. Meanwhile, the Reporter_arm is speculating about the recent interest of Armenian TV companies towards head of parliamentary opposition faction “Orinats Yerkir” – Artur Baghdasaryan, and connecting it with president Robert Kocharian’s recent comment, according to which Artur Baghdasaryan has higher “rating” than the ex-president Levon Ter-Petrossian. Reporter_arm also points to an interesting interview on the news portal E-channel, dealing with various political technologies employed by the ex-president and the Prime-Minister, presidential hopefull Serge Sargsyan, as well as speculating about Artur Baghdasaryan’s role in this elections:
The president has already sent the message in his last speeches. He says that there is an oppositional force, having obtained many votes and appearing in the National Assembly as a result of the parliamentary elections. We know that it’s about CofL and Arthur Baghdasaryan. He can be the so-called “fake” candidate. As usual, that candidate criticizes the main candidate in such an incoherent and not-to-the-point manner that the other candidates fail criticizing at all. He manages to criticize all the time without saying the main thing. Later, in the surveys conducted, the “fake” candidate” obtains many votes and then enters the second round. This is accepted in all the countries and for all the electoral cases.
The key topic for discussion was undoubtedly the Lost-Case of the Karabakh Committee, but first, here’s a background from Radio Liberty:
Armenian Prosecutor-General Aghvan Hovsepian on Friday announced that the files pertaining to a criminal investigation launched in 1988 into the activities of the Karabakh Committee are now kept by former president Levon Ter-Petrosian, a leading member of the Committee and one of the accused in the notorious criminal case.
Hovsepian further revealed that Ter-Petrosian ordered the case to be provided to him still when he served as president.
Later on the ex-president Ter-Petrossian returned the “lost” case to the prosecutor. Uzogh was one of the most active initiators of discussion on the issue, covering it here, here and here, and saying, that although in the course of discussions other bloggers are getting frustrated by the fact, that such type of pre-election stinking [more rough word used in the original text] is being uncovered only now, when LTP is gaining momentum as the main opposition candidate, the blogger remarks:
- Does the circumstance, that the fact of stealing [of the criminal case] is only uncovered now, justify the actions of LTP? – I don’t think so – it doesn’t.
- Does this whole issue give us an idea about how the prosecutor’s office was working in the times of LTP? – It definitely does.
- Does it demonstrate, that LTP was abusing his official position? – It demonstrates for sure.
- Gives us reasons to suspect, that there were some details in this case, which LTP intended to hide? – It definitely does.
Kornelij Glas is not surprised by the fact, that LTP “stole” the case, and tells a story, which according to him comes from a reliable source, according to which, LTP and his team took everything possible from the Presidential palace after his resignation in 1998, including furniture, books, etc…
Posting about the radical opposition rally scheduled for tomorrow, at 17:00, the F5 blog sounds worried, Unzipped is thoughtful:
Friends report from Yerevan that there are leaflets all over the capital inviting people for a (second) mass rally by ex-President and presidential hopeful Levon Ter-Petrosyan on 16 November. The main expectation of people who plan to go to the rally is that Levon at last will answer to the criticism over his period of presidency. They hope to hear his reflection over such issues as corruption, 1996 presidential elections (which many consider was a green light to all subsequent election frauds), Karabakh and so on. People expect and hope. Will Ter-Petrosyan deliver? We have to wait and see.
Serzh Sargsyan and the Republicans are getting ready to face the upcoming public appearance of LTP, and while the Prime Minister is all over TV promising prosperity to everyone in 5 years time as reported by Kornelij Glas, Republicans prepare a concert on “Saturday, just a day after ex-President Ter-Petrosyan 2nd rally […] in Opera square (Freedom sq) with invited pop stars from Russia, including Dima Belan. Formally, concert is organised “for students”. As Unzipped rightly concludes:
Election period is the best for Armenian pop music loving crowd, more specifically youth, and it is officially started. We’ve seen it during parliamentary elections. We’ve already seen an introduction for presidential elections on 26 October.
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“You go do your rallies, we will do concerts. Now see who will have more numbers.” There should be no doubts that Freedom sq will be packed during Saturday concert. There should be no doubts which side will get more numbers. But at the end… the big winners will be pop music loving youth. They will certainly enjoy this 3-months marathon.
Everyone to the rally, oh, sorry… concert!
Well, a lot will be more clear after tomorrow’s rally. Depending on the attendance, composition and mood of the rally and comparing the dynamics with the October 26th one, we can at least understand – is LTP gaining momentum, or loosing it. Who wants to bet?
