Polling Station, Arabkir, Yerevan, Republic of Armenia © Onnik Krikorian/Oneworld Multimedia for EurasiaNet 2007

Yesterday the OSCE observation mission for the 12 May parliamentary election held their press conference. According to the statement read out to an audience of assembled journalists, representatives of international organizations, diplomatic missions, some political parties, and civil society, the vote was “largely in accordance with international standards,” and was an improvement over past polls.

“These elections were a clear improvement and that is good for Armenian democracy,”, said Tone Tingsgaard, the Special Co-ordinator of the short-term election observers and Vice President of the OSCE PA. “Now, more work is needed to further consolidate this young democracy. That will require joint effort and will by all political forces. I hope we will see that happen in the years ahead.”

Leo Platvoet, the Head of the PACE delegation, said: “We congratulate the Armenian people on showing the will to hold democratic elections. Some challenges remain, such as intertwining between political and business interests and improvements are still needed to the electoral complaints procedure. The Council of Europe and its Assembly continue to stand ready to assist Armenia in this process.”

Marie Anne Isler Beguin, who headed the EP delegation, said: “With their participation in these elections, Armenian citizens have made a further step towards European democratic values as foreseen and promoted by the EU Neighborhood Policy. The EU delegation encourages the Armenian people to continue in this direction in view of forthcoming elections.”

However, a number of problems were also identified and recognized. In particular, many domestic observers, opposition proxies and journalists believe that massive vote buying occurred on election day and my personal opinion is that it was this that secured the ruling Republican party their victory. The OSCE also picked up on such reports.

“We heard about it,” said OSCE/ODIHR Ambassador Boris Frlec, who headed the organization’s long-term mission, in response to these reports. “We have seen queues [of people outside polling stations, a fact attributed by some observers to both overcrowding and vote buying - ed] but we haven’t witnessed any distribution of election bribes. Perhaps because such things are done with more caution.”

Despite the largely positive evaluation, the PACE’s Platvoet elaborated that the campaign and election had had both positive and negative characteristics. “It’s not black, and it’s not white,” he said. “But it’s more white than black.”

In Noragavit, an outlying district of Yerevan, reports of such bribes which involved the mass transportation of voters to polling stations appeared to have some substance. When I arrived the atmosphere was tense and the PEC Chairperson refused to allow me to take photographs where the Heritage Party’s Larissa Alaverdian, the first and former Human Rights Ombudsperson, was monitoring events.

Larrisa Alaverdian, Polling Station, Noragavit, Yerevan, Republic of Armenia © Onnik Krikorian/Oneworld Multimedia for EurasiaNet 2007

When I stood my ground policemen and Red Berets were called in, but thanks to a legal rapid response team made up of activists from the Civil Society Institute and Sksela, the Central Elections Commission was contacted and my rights as an accredited journalist to cover the election was upheld. Armenia Now also covers the reported electoral violations at this particular station.

Former Armenia Ombudsman and current Heritage Party candidate Larisa Alaverdyan told ArmeniaNow that in her voting precinct 12/26 in Noragavit district at school N98, voters had been brought by buses and were given markers for marking their ballots.

Alaverdyan complained to polling station officials and was told that voters were free to use “even their blood” for marking ballots.

Alaverdyan said that, generally, the scene there was conducive to the so-called “carousel voting” violation that has been used in previous elections in Armenia and other countries.

According to Alaverdyan, local observers at the precinct have called international observers to the precinct. She also said she will take measures to have the results at the precinct invalidated.

Apart from this polling station, however, it has to be said that elsewhere turnout appeared high and the conduct of the vote was calm and definitely appeared much better than previous elections. So, if people took bribes, they did it quite willingly. Given the absence of any real alternative to the government and the lack of trust many Armenians have in most political parties, this is perhaps not so surprising. Of course, we can’t guess or prove how many people took bribes either.

One election observer from the Diaspora, blogger Nareg from Cilicia.com’s Life in Armenia, also confirms that the vote held in the polling station he monitored for the It’s Your Choice organization was also conducted peacefully and calmly. Certainly, throughout the country, there appeared to be much fewer allegations of ballot box stuffing or voter and proxy intimidation. I think there’s no doubting this.

So, the day started early, because polling stations were to run from eight a.m. to eight p.m., and everyone at the stations - nine members of the local electoral committee (if that’s the right word for it), plus representatives of parties, individuals running and just plain ol’ observers - needed to be there an hour early. My spot was a school down the street from my house, and I got there to see everyone there already, on time, which was reassuring.

Everything went so smoothly, I can’t tell you. The team there was headed by a particularly active and capable lady, and she knew all the ins and outs of the process. Voting started on time, even a bit early, actually, and continued on and on and on and on… Ah, yes, that was the tedious part, or so I thought, all the waiting, hanging around, for twelve whole hours. I had opted for a full-day shift, because I really wanted to do this thing and do it properly, so, yes, especially as there was absolutely nothing fraudulent going on at my polling station, it got a bit tiring.

We finally ended at eight exactly, having received 1016 votes for the day.

Yesterday’s joint rally held with the participation of the Republic, New Times, Impeachment and People’s Party was poorly attended. Probably, you could even call it pitiful, but none of these parties stood a chance of winning anyway. Only Heritage and Orinats Yerkir appears to have gotten past the five percent threshold and they had enough sense not to join the demonstration yesterday although it’s still not clear what they intend to do other than challenge some results.

“What we had yesterday was not an election, but a state crime and the only way to fight against that crime is impeachment [of President Robert Kocharian],” Impeachment bloc leader Nikol Pashinian said in an appeal to voters. According to the latest preliminary results from the Central Election Commission, the Impeachment bloc failed to clear the 5 percent of the vote barrier to take seats in parliament.

Those preliminary results indicate that Armenia’s most radical opposition parties have already lost the election. In the new parliament there will be only two opposition parties - US-born former Foreign Minister Raffi Hovannisian’s Heritage Party and the Country of Law Party headed by former Parliamentary Speaker Artur Baghdasarian. The two parties, however, will have only approximately 10 seats, compared with the 22 seats won by nine opposition parties in the 2003 elections. (The Country of Law announced late on May 13 that it will petition the courts to reexamine its election results and will not accept the announced results as final. )

Attendance at the rally was far lower than at a May 9 pre-election demonstration that resulted in a clash with police. Roughly only a few hundred protestors - mostly middle-aged or elderly men, many of them onlookers munching sunflower seeds — braved occasional rain to join the protest outside of Yerevan’s opera house.

Anyway, preliminary results say that the ruling Republican Party won 33.8 percent of the vote, Prosperous Armenia won 15.1 percent — something of a paradox when you consider their stated 400,000 members — and the Armenian Revolutionary Federation won 13.1 percent. Only two opposition parties, Orinats Yerkir and Heritage, cleared the five percent threshold.

Incidentally, the Republican party held a private party to celebrate their victory and I was in the area. Even though it was still daytime, they launched fireworks into the air startling local residents and seemed very happy indeed. I got there as Armen Gevorgyan from the President’s Staff was leaving and just before Serzh left. I’ll post some photos when I get the chance. Meanwhile, the Armenian Blog Review has quotes from, and links to, other posts dealing with the election.

To end, however, I’ll give my personal opinion of this year’s parliamentary election. Did they meet international standards? Well, let me put it like this, I’d be thoroughly depressed if elections were held like this in England. However, were they a marked improvement over past elections? Yes. No doubt about it, and the OSCE/ODIHR statement is worded to recognize both the achievements and failures this time round.

Firstly, the opposition is weak and divided and cannot offer the electorate an alternative. Secondly, civil society has failed and many of those organizations that should act as a watchdog for democracy are also flawed, sometimes corrupt and often politically partisan. In some cases that was obvious from before the election campaign period even began, and was evident from some of the faces to be seen after the OSCE read out their statement yesterday.

Anyway, what this election has shown more than anything is that there is an urgent need for genuine civic education in Armenia. However, it should start now and not a few months before the election when the next batch of foreign donor money is made available. Still, the election marked a significant improvement in a sense, and many of the failings and criticisms of the government, opposition, civil society and electorate now need to be addressed.

Incidentally, I’ll post some more photos tonight or tomorrow.