Former Armenian Justice Minister calls opposition`s acceptance of  mandates alogical amid mass election violations

ArmInfo.  For the political opposition to accept parliamentary mandates despite  widespread violations during the June 7 elections is, to put it  mildly, illogical, according to Arpine Hovhannisyan, former  Vice-Speaker of the Armenian Parliament and former Minister of  Justice.

She noted that the entire public is currently debating  whether the opposition will accept their mandates and enter  parliament. She also added that the opposition forces that cleared  the threshold do not have any good options; the situation is highly  complex, and under any scenario, they will pay a very steep political  price.

"However, it is crucial that the decisions being made are not driven  by external impulses, but are political decisions that are  communicated to their own voters with absolute honesty and maturity,"  Hovhannisyan said. At the same time, the legal expert dismissed as  unrealistic, to put it mildly, the narrative being floated that if  the opposition forces backed by the public refuse their mandates,  incumbent Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan will initiate legislative  amendments to allow runner-up parties that failed to secure enough  votes into parliament instead. According to her, this scenario became  particularly implausible after pro- government figures, specifically  Parliament Speaker Alen Simonyan, began circulating these talking  points.

"This looks more like a propaganda lifeline thrown to the opposition,  as if to say, 'We are passing the ball to you—take it and legitimize  your mandates.' But I find this unrealistic and would even rule it  out, because Pashinyan will never cross his own red lines regarding  his core propaganda narratives—and his main narrative centers on the  fairness and legitimacy of these elections. Passing such legislation  would mean falsifying the election results by force of law or by a  Constitutional Court ruling, essentially fabricating the election and  distorting the will of the people," Hovhannisyan concluded.

According to her, this would cast such a shadow over the elections  and their legitimacy that no one would even remember who received  which votes during the electoral process.  At the same time,  Hovhannisyan believes a more realistic scenario would unfold if, by  some miracle, the opposition decided not to accept their mandates.  "In that case, the authorities would use every possible means to  pressure and demoralize the extra-parliamentary opposition. As a  result, within six months or a year, they would head to snap  elections, which would then produce a parliament with a completely  different political landscape," she noted.

The legal expert believes that the opposition is currently more  inclined to accept the mandates. "However, when there is talk of mass  election fraud, and when the 'Country to Live' party—a de jure member  of the 'Strong Armenia' bloc—states that it does not consider the  formation of the government to be legitimate, pushing such narratives  while simultaneously debating whether to take the mandates is, to put  it mildly, alogical under such conditions of electoral fraud,"  Hovhannisyan said.

She also dismissed talks about the possibility of poaching members of  the ruling faction over to the opposition camp as unserious.