Why is Law on State of Emergency Adopted Ahead of Elections?

Under no circumstances should the army become a tool in issues of domestic politics. Every country should have a law on the rule of law during a state of emergency, but the way in which the government brought this law to the National Assembly was unacceptable, head of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (Dashnaktsutyun, or ARF-D) parliamentary faction Vahan Hovhannisyan told journalists in the capital today.

“There’s a provision in the RA draft law on the rule of law during a state of emergency which was approved by parliament at its first reading that is completely unacceptable, according to which the president of a country in a state of emergency can annul the decision of any state or local governing body. According to the constitution, this in no way could’ve referred to the National Assembly, which means that there should’ve been an amendment here. Whether [the amendment] has been made or not I haven’t yet seen; I think this law was brought yesterday evening, which is odd — they took it to amend, knowing that the criticism, especially our criticism, was right,” he said.

Hovhannisyan recalled the process by which the law was adopted by parliament at its first reading whereby lawmakers voted in place of their absent colleagues, which, according to him, was covered very well by the press.

“Even afterwards, the government understood that this way the law contradicts the Constitution and the prime minister recalled it, but it’s been brought back again, as it’s considered to be urgent,” he said.

The lawmaker found it hard to say to what extent the “unacceptable mistakes” in the law were rectified.

“One thing is important: in any case, involving the army in domestic political affairs is unacceptable because this is how the Constitution considers it. If as described by members of government, demoralization is happening in the country, then they won’t be characterized as a domestic political struggle and then the situation will be completely different and for that we have the opportunity of enforcing not a ‘state of emergency’ but martial law,” he said.

According to Hovhannisyan, the draft law, as proposed, was unacceptable, which was why it will be amended and discussed again.

“The way the bill is raised seems unacceptable for us, because it’s well understood that elections are coming up — why did they suddenly turn their attention to and place importance on this issue right before the election? The public would have the right to think that the authorities are forecasting situations in which this law will be needed as a tool, but from what these situations arise, we have to fight against that, ballot stuffing, violations, buying votes and the rest, so that such situations don’t arise and not by presuming it’s all the same, you’re going to do this anyway and there will be backlash and you try to confront the backlash through this law — this isn’t an acceptable way [of doing things],” he concluded.