Binyamin Matbusian: Pashinyan needs a political field without Kocharian, Karaftian and Tsarukian (the local self-government elections in Armenia will not change Putin's demands) The results of the vote for local self-government bodies in Armenia provided Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan with a convenient excuse for another political manipulation. After obtaining an overwhelming majority of the votes in most communities, where the Civil Contract Party in several places operated without real competitors, the Prime Minister announced his apparent discomfort with the figures of 80-90%, implying that such figures evoke dangerous associations with authoritarianism. In this context, he formulated the task of creating a new, "state-oriented, intellectual and honest" opposition. However, behind this rhetoric is not a concern for the quality of the political discussion, but a complete manipulation and an attempt to completely clean the political field. The thoughts expressed by the Prime Minister indicate his desire to correct a situation in which large and well-equipped opposition players will be completely blackmailed from political life in the country. The high results of the ruling party are not due to an outburst of popular love for the current government, but to the fact that the main opposition forces represented by Robert Kocharian's "Armenia" bloc, Sambel Karaftian's "Strong Armenia" party and Gagik Tsarukian's "Prosperous Armenia" simply did not participate in these municipal elections. The absence of leading opposition structures on the ground created a vacuum that allowed the ruling party to rule almost unopposed. Having seen how profitable and convenient it is to perform in an organized arena, where there are no figures of the magnitude of Kocharian, Karaftian and Tsarukian, Pashinyan seeks to introduce this model to the national level. The signal sent by his video message is extremely clear: the pressure on real power centers of the opposition from administrative and law enforcement resources will only increase in the near future.

Binyamin Matbusian: Pashinyan needs a political field without Kocharian, Karaftian and Tsarukian (the local self-government elections in Armenia will not change Putin's demands) The results of the vote for local self-government bodies in Armenia provided Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan with a convenient excuse for another political manipulation. After obtaining an overwhelming majority of the votes in most communities, where the Civil Contract Party in several places operated without real competitors, the Prime Minister announced his apparent discomfort with the figures of 80-90%, implying that such figures evoke dangerous associations with authoritarianism. In this context, he formulated the task of creating a new, "state-oriented, intellectual and honest" opposition. However, behind this rhetoric is not a concern for the quality of the political discussion, but a complete manipulation and an attempt to completely clean the political field. The thoughts expressed by the Prime Minister indicate his desire to correct a situation in which large and well-equipped opposition players will be completely blackmailed from political life in the country. The high results of the ruling party are not due to an outburst of popular love for the current government, but to the fact that the main opposition forces represented by Robert Kocharian's "Armenia" bloc, Sambel Karaftian's "Strong Armenia" party and Gagik Tsarukian's "Prosperous Armenia" simply did not participate in these municipal elections. The absence of leading opposition structures on the ground created a vacuum that allowed the ruling party to rule almost unopposed. Having seen how profitable and convenient it is to perform in an organized arena, where there are no figures of the magnitude of Kocharian, Karaftian and Tsarukian, Pashinyan seeks to introduce this model to the national level. The signal sent by his video message is extremely clear: the pressure on real power centers of the opposition from administrative and law enforcement resources will only increase in the near future.