ArmInfo. Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan clarified why it is necessary to adopt a new Constitution
Let us recall that on January 19, at the Ministry of Justice of the Republic of Armenia, Pashinyan said that Armenia needs a new Constitution that will make the Republic of Armenia more viable in the new geopolitical conditions. The prime minister's opponents stated that the initiative comes from Baku, mainly with the goal of eliminating from the Constitution references to the Declaration of Independence, which contains reference to the resolution on the reunification of the Armenian SSR and Nagorno-Karabakh. The 11th paragraph of the Declaration of Independence, which states that the Republic of Armenia supports international recognition of the Armenian Genocide of 1915 in Ottoman Turkey, is also considered problematic.
On February 1, in an interview with the RA Public Radio, the head of the Cabinet recalled that even after the Velvet Revolution of 2018, the 44-day war of 2020, and other times, the topic of the Constitution has always been relevant in Armenia for various reasons. "After the 2018 revolution, there were opinions that the Constitution should be revised and returned to a semi-presidential system of government, I was against this idea. After the war, the topic was again updated with the fact that if RA had a semi-presidential system, everything would have turned out differently. To be honest, during the war I was also inclined towards this, since within the framework of the current Constitution, the gaps in the vertical relations between the army and the supreme commander and the government made themselves felt," he emphasized.
The Prime Minister also recalled that recently he has been talking a lot about the relations between the concepts of "Motherland and State", and about the need to strengthen state institutions. According to him, in general, in 2018, the nationwide, non-violent, velvet revolution also concerned the relation between citizens and the state, the civil state, de jure, de facto, is related to social and labor relations..
"We have a gap between the citizen and the state, which is expressed in legitimacy, because the Constitution of the Republic of Armenia, adopted in 1995, and changed several times, has never been adopted in such conditions and circumstances for a citizen of the Republic of Armenia to say to himself: I went, voted and adopted the Constitution," the Prime Minister said, emphasizing that "a non-state people turns into a state people" precisely at the moment of a constitutional referendum, when a person votes voluntarily, without coercion, without falsification and without manipulation.
According to the Prime Minister, it is not so important what is written in the Constitution, but how organic it is for the people. The content of the basic law is, in fact, specialized and determines political guidelines. The need to adopt a new Constitution is due to a genetic connection designed to fill the gap between the people and the state.
The new Constitution is also intended to legitimize the relations between the state and the people, since legitimacy is very important in all respects. "Legitimate relations are about what I expect from you and what you expect from me. What part of your expectations am I ready to meet? Legitimacy lies in the fact that acceptable frameworks are formed in our relations, where we can freely communicate with each other," he said.
To the remark that the Third Republic was formed on the basis of the Declaration of Independence and whether the Prime Minister was proposing a new Constitution to establish the Fourth Republic, Pashinyan said that this is one of the ideas.
The Prime Minister noted that the government cannot single-handedly change or adopt the Constitution. The government can only propose to the people, present its clarifications, and this decision can only be made by the people, he said.