On 17 February, the campaign for the constitutional referendum had officially kicked off in Armenia.
The ruling My Step bloc already established the “Yes” campaign headquarters, which is led by Minister of Territorial Administration and Infrastructures Suren Papikyan. Another My Step lawmaker, Alen Simonyan, said last week that the proposed constitutional changes are part of broader government efforts to strengthen judicial independence in Armenia. He said the authorities want to replace Tovmasyan even though the latter was always ready to “serve” them. “We want to have the kind of judicial system that may say No to us on some issues but will be independent. This judicial system has already proved that it’s not independent,” he stated.
A day later, the Armenian Central Election Commission reported that it received one application from a side bidding for the “No” campaign. The “No” campaign is led by the former de facto Ombudsman of Nagorno-Karabakh and co-founder of the “Path of Law” NGO in Armenia Ruben Melikyan. “Our dilemma is not legitimacy-not legitimacy, but lawfulness-non-lawfulness. We continue to insist that the referendum process was not lawful, that the appointment of this referendum is unconstitutional both in content and in procedural terms,“ Melikyan stated on the grounds of forming the movement. Melikyan’s initiative is comprised of 61 lawyers, and beside him other notable figures in the movement are Gohar Meloyan, Arsen Babayan, Elinar Vardanyan, Tigran Atanesyan, Astghik Matevosyan, Artak Asatryan, Siranush Sahakyan, Anahit Sargsyan, Arsen Mkrtchyan.
He added that his initiative pursues two main goals: 1) giving the opportunity to Armenian citizens who have something to say, to have a platform for all the options that exclude the “yes” option, and 2) to give those citizens who have oversight mechanisms, as a proxy, to enable those oversight mechanisms to be applied.
While voicing their concerns over the upcoming referendum, the Prosperous Armenia and Bright Armenia parties said they will be privy to the referendum process. The former ruling Republican Party of Armenia was not joining the process of a “No” either. The Armenian Revolutionary Federation-Dashnaksutyun (ARF-D) called upon the voters in Armenia to ignore the upcoming referendum, citing ″unlawful actions″ and ″adventurism″ behind the authorities’ intention.
On 6 February, Armenia’s parliament decided to hold a referendum on constitutional changes that would dismiss seven of the nine members of the Constitutional Court who are locked in a bitter dispute with Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s government. The decision to hold the referendum was considered to be very controversial by many domestic and international actors in Armenia (Caucasus Watch reported).
