Election 2021: We wanted things to be better, but it still ended up  `like always`

ArmInfo.On Sunday, the CEC summed up the official results of the early parliamentary elections in Armenia. Nikol Pashinyan's "Civil Contract" party gained 53.91%,  Robert Kocharian's "Hayastan" bloc - 21.04% of the vote. The third  force in parliament was the "I Have Honor" bloc with 5.23% of the  vote. Of the registered 2 million 595,512 voters, 49.39% of voters  voted. Thus, the "Civil Contract" party will be represented in the  parliament of the 8th convocation by the 71 seats, the "Armenia" and  "I Have Honor" blocs with 29 and 7 seats, respectively.

Expectations

Analyzing and drawing conclusions from such election results, first  of all, it seems necessary to note their, to put it mildly,  inconsistency with the mood prevailing in the Armenian post-war  society. And in determining these sentiments, we will purposefully  not rely on the "opinion polls" conducted in the country during the  pre-election period by all kinds of "gallups". It's not a secret for  anyone that the defeat of Armenia in the 44-day war with the Turkic  world, the terms of the armistice following the results of this war  and, most importantly, the unseemly role played in all this by Prime  Minister Pashinyan, resulted in a catastrophic drop of his rating,  personally as well as his party. Determining Kocharian and Sargsyan's  real ratings, it seems necessary to emphasize that in conversations  on the streets and in kitchens, the names of former presidents, as a  rule, continue to be accompanied by the prefix "robbers". In  fairness, it should also be emphasized that the same Pashinyan, on  the eve of the elections, retained, especially in the villages and in  the state apparatus, a loyal electorate of 25-30%. Kocharian and  Sargsyan's real electorate consisted and still consists of their  closest entourage and former state officials, who were deprived by  Pashinyan in 2018 "from the food bowl." And, with all the  understanding of the scale of corruption in pre-revolutionary  Armenia, there could not be more than 8-10% of such people.

Paradoxes

It is clear that such a foreign policy and internal background of the  election campaign quite naturally led to the formation of sentiments  in the nth part of the Armenian society in the spirit of "neither  exes and nor currents" and, accordingly, a request for a third,  alternative force. However, as a result of the elections, we were  faced with a paradox, when none of the 22, of course, conditional,  alternative forces to these very former and incumbent forces entered  into parliament. And the "current" and "former" ones entered the  parliament. Another paradox is the formation of the parliament of the  8th convocation exclusively from pro-Russian forces. In any case,  neither the Civil Contract, nor the Republicans, nor the Kocharyan  force, either before, during or after the election campaign, were  ever caught in anti-Russian sentiments, let alone statements. In  contrast to the Republic party, the Shirinyan-Babajanyan bloc, Bever  and other forces, who by the way, had very good pre-election chances.

In this light, it should be emphasized that the elections were held  against the background of the hopeless growth of anti-Russian  sentiments in the Armenian society. The reason for such tendencies  was the rather ambiguous position and role of the Russian leadership  in the days and, most importantly, in the formation of the results of  last year's war in Artsakh. In this sense, the reaction, or rather  the absence of Moscow's reaction to Yerevan's appeal to the CSTO for  help, in connection with Azerbaijan's aggression against Armenia  itself, did not add in this sense. It would seem that these  circumstances should have persuaded, realizing the essence of what  happened, a part of the Armenian society to vote "for" the  anti-Russian forces.  It is appropriate to state here that almost  everyone understands the real reasons for the 44-day war in Armenia.  But the results of the June 20 vote showed exactly the opposite:

Hammers, sickles and protest voting

Based on a number of parameters, first of all, it seems possible to  state that the results of the elections, in general, reflected the  real situation in the mood of the Armenian society and therefore are  legitimate. And the elections, respectively, were democratically  held. Yes, the election results, namely the high results of Pashinyan  and Kocharyan himself, cause some surprise. However, on the whole,  the reason for the huge gap between the "former" and the "current"  with the rest of the political field in Armenia also lies on the  surface. And they consist in the fact that, in at least one  parameter, the elections of 2021 became a mirror image of almost all  elections in the history of the Third Republic. As in the elections  from 1996 to 2017, voting in these elections was also protest. On  June 20, the bulk of the citizens who came to the polling stations  voted not "for" but "against". In this particular case, against  "defeatist - Pashinyan" and "robber - Kocharyan". Only the same  25-30% and 8-10%, respectively, voted for Pashinyan and Kocharyan.  But by no means 54 and 21% of voters.

It should be especially noted that Nikol Pashinyan, Robert Kocharian  and partly Serzh Sargsyan played a significant role in the formation  of such a public discourse. From the very moment he came to power,  Pashinyan never ceased dragging Kocharyan's scarecrow with him around  the country, presenting him to society whenever he expressed doubts  about his own infallibility. During the election campaign,  Kocharyan's demonization reached its climax and was accompanied by a  demonstration of the hammer and loud promises to smash the heads of  all the "exes" without exception. Kocharyan waved a sickle in  response, hinting at the castration of Pashinyan. Serzh Sargsyan's  behavior during the election campaign seems to be the topic of a  separate study of the world pillars in the field of neurolinguistics.  Thus, Pashinyan and Kocharyan, as a result of this behavior, achieved  the main thing - they instilled in the nth, let's say, not the most  educated part of society a genuine horror towards each other. And,  judging by the election results, Pashinyan, on the whole, did it much  better than Kocharyan. It is very possible that a hammer helped him  in this, and perhaps natural eloquence and an irresistible craving  for populism.

Outcomes

From the very beginning of the idea of holding early parliamentary  elections in post-war Armenia, your humble servant asserted the  complete senselessness of this event. This was primarily due to the  understanding that in the conditions of the next inevitable "protest  vote", Pashinyan's power, one way or another, will remain afloat. In  this particular case, it is no longer important through maintaining  an absolute majority, gaining a constitutional majority, or even  through a coalition with other forces. Even then, it was clear that  as a result of elections in such conditions, young and not very  Dashnaktsakans, dollar multimillionaires, former governors and former  generals would come to replace the "prosperous" and "bright"  lawmakers. What did all this give to society? The question is  rhetorical and meaningless, but, nevertheless, it has an answer -  absolutely nothing. In contrast to the ruling party and the "exes".  The incumbent regime confirmed its legitimacy, the latter took a  small but step towards their own long-awaited return. You and I had  the opportunity to make a choice and see its embodiment, its real  results in the prime minister's chair. It is even possible to feel  the positive results of your own choice on your own skin. But you and  I again succumbed to the tricks of propaganda, again became a victim  of another substitution of the public agenda and again embarked on an  inherently adventurous protest vote. In short, the results of the  June 20 vote can be expressed in the immortal aphorism of Viktor  Stepanovich Chernomyrdin " we wanted things to be better, but it  still ended up 'like always'' .