Friday, July 17 2015 10:18

The adoption of the constitutional reforms initiated by the authorities will result in establishment of the ruling party's dictatorship in Armenia and perpetuation of the regime of Serzh Sargsyan and his party, Levon Zurabyan, Head of the Armenian National Congress Faction, has told ArmInfo.  

 

"Before analyzing the essence of the draft reforms, it is necessary to understand why the authorities have initiated these reforms. In one of his speeches Serzh Sargsyan himself said that he has certain reservations concerning Armenia's switch to the parliamentary regime.  The only goal of the constitutional reforms is to ensure the retention of the power of Serzh Sargsyan and his people. Moreover, this is being done at the expense of the country's security and stability," said Zurabyan.    

 

As regards the essence of the document, Zurabyan thinks that it provides the Speaker of the Parliament with too many powers, which were previously the President's powers.  Under the current Constitution, the President appoints the Prime Minister following a consultation with the parliamentary factions. Now that function will be performed by the Speaker in case of the Prime Minister's resignation or if that post remains vacant for some reasons, In Armenia it may happen quite often given the vulnerability of the Prime Minister's figure," said Zurabyan.

 

In addition, he says the new draft Constitution has certain provisions resembling the provisions of the Soviet Constitution. "For instance, the document envisages creation of a new body resembling the Presidium of the Supreme Council of the USSR. In our case, it will be called a Council of the National Assembly."

 

The oppositionist is also displeased with the provisions related to the rights and powers of the President:  "The new draft Constitution restricts the President's functions to those of a person observing the political processes. The fact that the President is not elected by means of direct elections but by an electoral board, suggests no doubts that the President will completely be dependent on the parliamentary majority."

 

Zurabyan thinks another provision triggering concerns is that the functions of the supreme commander-in- chief are delegated to the Prime Minister in times of war only. "How can you imagine that? How can the Prime Minister master the commander-in-chief's functions in times of war without dealing with such issues before? This is a direct threat to the country's security," says the oppositionist.

 

The MP also comments on the provisions related to formation of the Parliament. He stresses that Serzh Sargsyan and the authors of the draft reforms have done everything possible to work out an electoral system that would provide the ruling party with an absolute majority in the Parliament. "They have invented an as-yet unheard trick of a second round in parliamentary elections to provide only one party with the absolute parliamentary majority. That provision of the draft reforms resembles Article 6 of the Soviet Constitution about the dominant role of the Communist Party. As we see, all the statements that the draft reforms aim to ensure the further democratic development of Armenia are groundless. Actually, an attempt is being made to form a party dictatorship under the guise of transition to a parliamentary regime.  By the way, many dictatorial countries with the dominant role of one party and its secretary general have that very parliamentary regime. That is to say, all the remarks that this system is the citadel of democracy are groundless," he says.

 

Zurabyan stresses that Serzh Sargsyan's "constitutional initiative" is a challenge against the Armenian society. He thinks the reforms actually deprive the people of the constitutional freedoms in favor of absolute dictatorship of the ruling party. "We will exert all efforts to mobilize the people and the public- political field to raise a wave of resistance to prevent our country from turning into a tyrannical system," he says.