{"id":269422,"date":"2015-11-20T14:49:42","date_gmt":"2015-11-20T10:49:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.epress.am\/?p=269422"},"modified":"2015-11-20T15:02:54","modified_gmt":"2015-11-20T11:02:54","slug":"armenian-officials-use-their-positions-to-promote-constitutional-changes-civic-activist-claims","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/2015\/11\/20\/armenian-officials-use-their-positions-to-promote-constitutional-changes-civic-activist-claims.html","title":{"rendered":"Armenian Officials Use Their Positions to Promote Constitutional Changes, Civic Activist Claims"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tArmenian authorities have made a bad habit of using available administrative resources during electoral processes, Head of the Gyumri-based Asparez Journalists' Club, member of Gyumri Council of Elders Levon Barseghyan<\/span><\/a> said in a press conference Friday, November 20, presenting parts of the summary on specific cases of abuse of administrative resources compiled by “Civilian Observer,” a civic initiative created ahead of the December 6 national referendum on the constitutional amendments put forward by president Serzh Sargsyan.\n<\/p>\n

\n\tAuthorities took one of the most controversial steps of the campaign when they allowed voting with identification cards, he said. The bill passed on November 11<\/span><\/a> enabled more than half a million Armenian citizens who possess ID cards to vote in the referendum; however, Barseghyan stated, observation missions, civic society and opposition representatives have very limited tools to monitor the process.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t“Imagine that a person will only be identified by the photo on the ID card. How do we know that's the same person? There's no address; they'll have to look into the logs, check that the name is right, and that's it. There is a huge risk of mobile organized groups going station to station and voting for missing electorate,” Barseghyan said.\n<\/p>\n

\n\tThe summary also documented cases of use of administrative resources at the level of governors, mayors, and community heads. For instance, as stated by Barseghyan, “Civilian Observer” held a discussion in the town of Meghri which was also attended by mayor Arshavir Hovhannisyan. After the discussion, when the initiative had already left the town, three pre-registered Meghri observers told “Civilian Observer” that they refused to carry out observation mission on referendum day because it's “too risky:” they were promised a job and do not want to chance it “for one day's troubles.”\n<\/p>\n

\n\tIt's noteworthy, he added, that ahead of the December 6 referendum Armenian Defense Minister Seyran Ohanyan, whose views can have a direct effect on the military's voting, has also gotten involved in “the circus that is the 'yes' campaign.”\n<\/p>\n

\n\tThe “look, we can do anything, the power's in our hands” attitude is yet another manifestation of the authorities' cynicism, Barseghyan said. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s noteworthy, he added, that ahead of the December 6 referendum Armenian Defense Minister Seyran Ohanyan, whose views can have a direct effect on the military’s voting, has also gotten involved in \u201cthe circus that is the ‘yes’ campaign…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":269418,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tstyn_error":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[62301,54731,62882,63027,18396],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/269422"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=269422"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/269422\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/269418"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=269422"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=269422"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=269422"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}