“The current authorities are eliminating political opponents who pose an electoral threat”: Andrey Perla

Andrey Perla commented to Alpha News on the mass arrests of the opposition ahead of elections in Armenia, as well as on the upcoming Armenia–European Union summit in Yerevan.

“The lack of confidence of the current authorities is evident precisely in the electoral context, in the context of the pre-election campaign. If we assume that the Armenian government and the current prime minister have some kind of strategy and are following it, then this strategy consists of systematically removing from the political field all those opponents who may pose an electoral threat. From this point of view, two directions of activity are noteworthy: constant repression against the opposition and changes to electoral legislation that limit the capabilities of independent observers and increase the scope not so much for outright vote rigging as for excluding improperly filled ballots from the count. This latest development, in terms of the ability to manage voting results, seems to me to be key in the strategy currently pursued by the government or rather, the ruling party of Armenia, since it governs by controlling a majority in parliament. With almost every new step to increase control over the political field, they intensify irritation among the Armenian electorate toward the current government. You don’t need to be an expert in Armenian culture to say that the arrest of a mother of many children in itself has an extremely negative impact on the authorities’ image in Armenia, even if she is indeed guilty of something. And if her guilt is, to put it mildly, not obvious to voters, then all the more so,” Perla noted.

According to the analyst, a paradoxical process is unfolding: on the one hand, the government of Nikol Pashinyan is indeed increasing control over the situation, while on the other, through its own actions, it is worsening its chances of victory.

“We do not know very much about Armenia’s electoral landscape, as sociological studies are published rather infrequently. Still, we do have some relatively scientific or quasi-scientific polling data. According to the most favorable polls for the current authorities, they have somewhere between 20% and 24% of the vote. Many say it is much lower, but let’s assume they do indeed have about a quarter of the vote. It is easy to understand what that means: 75% of voters, three quarters, are not on their side. And these three quarters, who are consistently dissatisfied with the actions of the government of Nikol Pashinyan, are becoming more entrenched in their unwillingness to vote for him. Therefore, I currently assess his prospects as rather weak,” Perla said.

Speaking about the Armenia–European Union summit to be held in May in Yerevan, the expert said that the meeting is intended to signal the pro-European direction in which Pashinyan is leading Armenia.

“Pashinyan is not the first legitimate leader of a post-Soviet state to embark on this path. Ukraine moved persistently in this direction, and Mikheil Saakashvili pursued a similar course with Georgia. And now — Armenia. If Pashinyan’s government were fully consistent in its movement toward the European Union and nowhere else, I can assume that a much larger share of Armenian voters than currently support him would say: ‘Yes, we are indeed a European people, we deserve to be members of the EU.’ However, the government’s real policy remains inconsistent in its supposedly pro-European actions. The EU summit in Yerevan will not strengthen Pashinyan’s position. Rather, it reinforces his image as a multi-vector politician who cannot truly decide on a direction. Therefore, although the European summit in Yerevan is conceived as a powerful show of support for the current authorities in Armenia, in practice, I believe it will have the opposite effect,” Perla said.