Tom de Waal: RPA “dinosaurs” are the biggest problem - Mediamax.am

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Tom de Waal: RPA “dinosaurs” are the biggest problem


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Senior fellow at Carnegie Europe Thomas de Waal commented on resignation of Serzh Sargsyan as the Prime Minister of Armenia, saying that the latter deserves credit for what he did.

“First of all, I’m glad to have been proved wrong about the Armenian people, their readiness to protest and demand change! In Armenia a month ago the only way I saw change coming was from above. So I got it wrong. Call it a perfect storm,” he said.

 

He emphasized that “Armenia is a classic case of a society so unfree that the public was alienated and angry, but free enough to let them protest. This is not Russia.”

 

“Important to note also that there is no systemic opposition in Armenia. This is a young urban crowd, who don’t belong to parties, are barely represented in parliament. Now that Armenia is a parliamentary republic again, the Republican Party dinosaurs in parliament are the biggest problem. As in Russia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan the problem is a fusion of high politics and big business. Parliamentary elections thus badly needed, but opposition has no structure or party to organize around,” Tom de Waal said.

 

Touching upon Serzh Sargsyan’s resignation, Tom de Waal said that he deserves credit for what he did yesterday. “No Yanukovych he,” Waal remarked. He compared this resignation with that of Levon Ter-Petrosyan in 1988, which was also influenced by Serzh Sargsyan.  The first President of Armenia said that he did not want to be Armenia’s Gamsakhurdia, when he quit peacefully, the analyst reminded.

 

Tom de Waal also noted that, according to his information, Sargsyan did not really want the job of PM, would have preferred to remain behind the scenes and give the position to someone else. “There was no obvious new frontman. Quite probably, the system needed him to take it more than even he did,”  said senior fellow at Carnegie Europe.

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