After introducing readers to the work of the domestic observation organization It’s Your Choice as the May parliamentary election approaches, now comes the turn of IFES, formerly known as the International Foundation for Election Systems. Yesterday, I interviewed Chedomir Flego, Chief of Party, and Aghassi Yesayan, Senior Elections Expert, from IFES in Armenia.

An Interview with Chedomir Flego, IFES
13 March 2007.

IFES is a non-partisan nonprofit organization founded in 1987. IFES provides professional advice and technical assistance in the promotion of democracy worldwide and serves as a clearinghouse of information on governance, rule of law, civil society, and elections. In addition to its current office in Armenia, established in 1996, IFES has field offices in 22 countries and program experience in more that 120 countries worldwide.

Aghassi Yesayan, Senior Elections Expert at IFES, also sat in on the interview.

ONNIK KRIKORIAN: Thank you very much for the opportunity to hold this interview. Is IFES only concerned with elections in Armenia?

CHEDOMIR FLEGO: IFES has been working in Armenia for 10 years and previously concerned itself with civil society and civic education. Now our main work is exclusively concerned with election assistance, yes.

OK: Can you give me an overview of what IFES is doing in preparation for the May Parliamentary Election?

CF: Yes, we’re working in several areas. The first is voter registry and voter list updates. As we all know, and as I’m sure you know, there have been many complaints about the accuracy of the voter list during elections held in Armenia and about a year and a half ago, the Government decided to give the responsibility for that list to the Police and OVIR because they had a centralized and probably the most up to date database in the country. So, it was logical to centralize it because before it was compiled by the 937 or whatever local authority bodies.

The Police and OVIR have done a pretty good job with this. That is to say we’ve done some checking of the database and we know that there are very few duplicates, deaths, and any of the other technical errors which have been a problem in the past, included in the list. So, we’re now at the stage where we’re working with the Police and OVIR to regularly update the list just as it is in other countries before elections. Simply put, voter lists need to be updated because people move from one place to another and they don’t always notify the authorities when they change their address.

When you have a majoritarian system, people need to be registered for their local precinct and working with the police, we’re undertaking an exercise to alert the public as to the need for them to check the voter registry, and if necessary, change their details at OVIR. IFES is also undertaking an exercise where we’ve recruited 7 volunteer groups of 15-35 people to go door to door to help citizens check that they’re correctly registered. If they’re not, then these groups will provide advice on how to do that.

Another major project is being undertaken in cooperation with the Central Elections Commission (CEC) to train members of the Precinct Election Commission (PEC). There’s nearly 20,000 people involved in PECs and Territorial Election Commissions (TECs) and our office has prepared training materials and planned a training programme as well as printed a number of materials in collaboration with the CEC and OSCE that will be given to the PEC members. This will mainly take place in the 10 days prior to the election because the intent is to focus on procedural training.

There are many changes to the Electoral Code so the PEC members need to know the new procedures. Of course, they are also receiving assistance with this from the CEC, but previous training and accreditation of the PECs has only focused on the legal aspect — the Constitution, the Electoral Code and so on — which is fine, but we’re focusing on the procedures through a step by step guide.

OK: Amendments to the Electoral Code now allow for the stamping of soldiers’ documents and ballots will have to be placed in envelopes, but what other procedural changes are there, or are these the main ones?

AGHASSI YESAYAN: There’s the issue of the police. There will be 6,000 police on duty on election day, so they will be voting at whatever polling station they’re at.

CHEDOMIR FLEGO: They’ve also introduced voting in hospitals so patients will be able to vote for parties in the proportional system, but not for the majoritarian, so there will be mobile polling. When a mobile ballot box goes from the PEC to a hospital, any one of the observers and proxies may go with it. We also have a disability programme that will cover several areas. We have selected a group of NGOs representing various groups with disabilities in Armenia, and one of the first projects will be to construct wheelchair ramps at selected polling stations where the presence of disabled voters is known. At the same time, wheelchairs can fit under tables and booths so they can vote in private as every other voter would.

There will be a number of changes like this and we anticipate that 8-10 polling stations will be fitted with ramps prior to this parliamentary election. The second part of the project concerns blind voters, and we’re introducing what we call a tactile ballot guide — a specal folder with squares cut out so that a blind person can vote in private and in secret without the assistance of another person. A regular ballot can be inserted in the guide with the cutout for each box where you mark your choice, and beside each will be a raised bump.

Through NGOs we will produce an audio guide informing blind voters which candidate is at which position on the ballot paper, and we’ll be announcing this on Friday in Yerevan with the disability groups.

The third part concerns itself with voter information. Disability groups have often said that they just don’t receive the same amount of information and they’re now working with the CEC so that all of the Public Service Announcements (PSAs) broadcast on television will include sign language. There are a series of activities like that, plus posters, leaflets, and other materials which will either be in large print for those who have problems with their eyesight, sign language or available as audio recordings.

OK: You’ve mentioned the voter list, but are you involved with setting up and maintaining the CEC’s web site?

CF: The CEC has had its web site for some time although we are certainly helping to enhance the search engine for people to use to check that they’re on the list. However, as I understand it, only something like 7 percent of people have access to the Internet in Armenia, so for those who don’t have it, we’re also going to put the database with a new search engine on a CD-ROM and provide it to the local authorities and other partners. You only need a standard computer to read a CD-ROM so we’re thinking of producing about 1,500 copies of this to give to various organizations throughout the country.

OK: With regards to those people who have migrated from Armenia, but who are still registered as being here, is that something else you’re concerned with?

CF: Definitely.

OK: So is the voter list pretty accurate?

CF: Let me put it this way. The Police and OVIR have tidied up the general inaccuracies, but there are some areas where they’ve not been able to do that because there are critical ommissions in the current law as it relates to the voter registration process in Armenia. The authorities have already recognized that the current database, which is basically the passport database and provides data for the voter list, needs to be changed to a new database which will be called the State Population Database. This is a more modern system which can be improved it in a number of ways so that it is more like a civic registry.

This database will be connected to a number of other State bodies such as the Ministry of Justice for deaths, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for overseas voters and so on. With this new database we will also be looking to do a number of new things. Because there are critical ommissions in the current registration process we have asked the Dean of Law at the American University of Armenia (AUA) to look at a research project examing the current legal status of voter registration which can recommend amendments to the current system or maybe even suggest an alternative such as a model from a European State which has succesfully changed its voter registration process.

Hopefully this will provide the legal basis for the new database which the State is going to use.

OK: But this will be after the May Parliamentary Election?

CF: Yes, because it’s not possible now. However, there a number of very critical areas in the current law. For example, residential qualifications are not clearly stated in the current law and as you said, there are a number of Armenians working in other countries sometimes for the short term, but sometimes for the long term or permanently. Right now, the law does not state clearly enough what residential qualifications are or when the authorities should remove a name from the voter list. If someone has been gone for 10 years or longer, should they remain on the list?

This is not clearly specified in the current law and that’s why we believe a legal review is necessary so we are working on that. We are also working with the police to improve the procedure they’re using with regards to the creation of the list so that they can use what we might call more international or European standards in the compilation of the voter list. If this is done, when there are critical ommissions you can still read it with the correct intent.

OK: Recently there was a demonstration outside the Presidential Palace staged by former residents evicted from their homes in Central Yerevan. Some alleged that because they were no longer registered at a place of residence, they were no longer able to register to vote. Is this the case?

AGHASSI YESAYAN: This is a key issue, but there is a special procedure if you are not registered anywhere so you can still be included in the voters list.

CHEDOMIR FLEGO: Current legislation says that if you own your property you can be registered as a permanent resident there, and if you rent a property you can register as a temporary resident if the owner gives you permission. However, there is a third category for those people that neither own the property or are unable to gain the permission of the owners. You can request that the Police and OVIR give you factual registration. That requires the police to visit to check that you actually do live where you say you do, but there is this option.

The current system of registration is a leftover from the Soviet Propiska system so now we’re working with the police on how to change this. The Electoral Code says that OVIR registers people by place of residence, and Armenia abolished the Propiska system in 1995, but some of it still lingers on. So, we’re working with the police and the Dean of Law at the AUA. If there are issues about property, this can be dealt with by the cadastre and other State organizations.

The persons [protesting outside of the Presidential Palace] you are referring to are citizens of the Republic of Armenia and should be able to register at their place of residence regardless of whether they own the property or not. Perhaps they simply don’t know about factual registration.

OK: You’ve raised the issue of only a small number of Armenians having access to the Internet, but what about newspaper adverts, posters and other more traditional methods of communication?

CF: We have a whole series of posters, leaflets, pamphlets, PSAs and radio announcements that are in various stages of production. We’ve already published some, and are about to publish more.

OK: One concern that’s been raised about the amended Electoral Code regards the lack of a quorum needed to make decisions in the PECs. Some argue that this is because of the opposition boycott of elections in the past which might include withdrawing their members from the PECs, but counter that even so, why remove the need for a quorum? Why not simply lower it?

AGHASSI YESAYAN: If I am a voter my vote should be counted regardless of the will of a few officials if they decide to boycott the PEC. My only concern, or rather reservation, is that a session [of the PEC] is considered valid regardless of the number of participants provided that all means of communication with absent members have been exhausted first. However, this “means of communication” has not been defined.

If there is a problem with particular decisions being made on election day, citizens and political parties can still appeal to the courts. Anyway, it seems to me that the amendments made last year to the Electoral Code were actually pretty good. It’s a positive step forwards, and let me give you just one example. While observers and proxies didn’t get everything they wanted, they do now have more rights. In particular, observers have an enhanced legal status and can move around in polling stations more freely, and they can photograph and film the whole counting process.

So, we’re generally quite happy with the changes to the Electoral Code, but now we want to see that they are implemented with the same good intention through which they were drawn up.

OK: In an interview conducted last month, the Chairperson of the It’s Your Choice domestic observation organization said that regardless of the changes, even earlier versions of the Electoral Code allowed for democratic elections in Armenia. What matters more is whether or not there is the political will to hold them in the first place. Of course, there are some gray areas as we’re seeing with the display of political advertising before the official campiagn period, but others say that this is irrelevent in the context of other larger problems such as voter lists or registration and ballot box stuffing.

CF: On that, my recommendation would be to take the [political] advertising component out of the Electoral Code. It belongs somewhere else and most countries have removed regulations on campaign advertising out and placed them under different legislation. There is also the need for the review and reform of the campaign financing regulations. The public has the right to know who is funding a particular campaign, how much has been raised for the purpose, and how much has been spent, but I believe that the law puts too low a ceiling on such spending in Armenia.

In today’s world, the cost of campaignings is higher than is allowed for by the Electoral Code, and this is a problem for all candidates and all parties. There have been changes, but there needs to be further review, in my opinion.

OK: In addition to the appearance of political advertising before the campaign perdiod has officially begun, there are also allegations that passports and other forms of documents such as student identification cards are being collected by one political party, in particular, in exchange for money or “charitable services.” Is IFES concerned by such reports, especially if “the intention is allegedly intended only to increase the number of members a political party has?

CF: We’ve heard the same stories. People’s documents are reportedly being collected and copied. Certainly, I have heard of this, and have also read accounts on the Internet detailing how citizens have been paid to hand over their passports for a certain period of time.