Members of the Armenian National Congress (ANC), the Prosperous Armenia Party (PAP) and Heritage thus responded to the president’s recent statement suggesting that the government “take a fresh look at the 12 demands” of the Troika.
A reform of the electoral code to abolish the single-mandate votes that are partly used in parliamentary elections today replacing them with a 100-percent proportional ballot is one of the 12 demands presented by the opposition in June.
“If [Sargsyan’s] statement is not yet another imitation … the authorities should embrace our draft amendments to the Election Code,” Heritage’s parliamentary leader Ruben Hakobyan said after a meeting with senior lawmakers representing the PAP and the ANC. “They should just show that they are ready to deliver on their statements,” he told journalists.
At the same time, Hakobyan made it clear that the opposition parties will not stop seeking “regime change”. He, however, announced no dates for the Troika’s next anti-government rally in Yerevan.
Another representative of Heritage, Armen Martirosyan, also said during a Wednesday night talk show on Yerkir Media TV that enacting changes in the electoral legislation is a sort of precondition to the government for starting a dialogue. He insisted, however, that the main subject of such a dialogue will be “change of government”.
The Armenian authorities have so far refused to enact the electoral changes sought by the opposition. Parliament Speaker Galust Sahakyan, a senior member of the ruling Republican Party of Armenia reiterated this position on Wednesday.
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