19:12 . 24/05
PAP faction will have chairmen of NA standing committees: this issue is regulated by the National Assembly Regulations-Law, according to which the number of the members of a faction is taken into consideration while appointing the parliamentary posts.
PAP refused to form a coalition government, that is, it will not form a part of the country’s government, therefore, again according to the National Assembly Regulations-Law, it is considered to be an opposition. How do political forces respond to PAP’s entrance into the opposition field?
Immediately before hearing the news about PAP’s refusal to form a coalition, Stepan Safaryan from Heritage Party was supposing that PAP would form a coalition with RPA. Safaryan remained resolute even after being informed about the statement.
“It’s all the same, PAP has no opportunity to change its position in the political field whether it forms a coalition or not,” he said.
According to Safaryan, transfer to the opposition field includes risks for PAP. It will face trials, and they can be both connected with inner party developments and with electorate:
“The electorate that voted for PAP, was not PAP’s electorate and it will not be retained. This was the electorate opposing to RPA, which PAP will not retain,” Safaryan said.
According to ARF-D Supreme Body representative Armen Rustamyan, a new political situation is emerging and this is the important thing.
“The opportunities for the opposition to counterbalance and to restrain the authorities increase in the National Assembly. The rest in the issue of how PAP will act is a matter of practice and tactics, and it will be clear in future,” Rustamyan said.
Should PAP enter into the coalition, it would support the single presidential candidate in the coming presidential elections, while in this case on the threshold of the presidential elections competitive and alternative options will emerge.
“This, of course, isn’t advantageous for RPA as should they have a single presidential candidate they would state they already have 80% of the votes. In this case, without PAP and only with Orinats Yerkir Party they hardly have 50% of votes. And if we also take the majoritarian representation into consideration, the situation completely changes,” Armen Rustamyan said.
ARF-D will cooperate with PAP in the parliament, and the options of cooperation will be discussed in near future. PAP’s five-year partner RPA, naturally, doesn’t speak about cooperation at this moment. It doesn’t need clarifying once more what it should do without PAP. Galust Sahakyan told aravot.am they decided long ago what they will do. Asked if it is possible that administrative pressures could be exerted on PAP, the RPA deputy chairman answered: “Forget about that: RPA has never exerted pressures on any political force”.
