Raffi Hovannisian 2008?

Along with other members of his team, the opposition Heritage party leader US-born Raffi Hovannisian is considered among the cleanest of politicians in Armenia. Now, that isn’t saying much in a country such as this, but even by international standards its hard to think of many countries that can boast of having such figures with such an incredible amount of respect and admiration associated with their names. Indeed, in a recent USAID-funded survey, Hovannisian was considered to be one of the most popular figures in Armenia today.

According to the report, Heritage party and ex-foreign minister of Armenia Raffi Hovannisian, whose party leads the opposition movement outside parliament, is clearly the most trusted political leader in all groups, as the report concludes that “he is perceived as the most honest, patriotic, and promising figure.”

Ironically, however, many of those looking for an alternative to the previous government said that this would not necessarily translate into votes and instead backed the radical opposition in the form of Aram Sarkisyan’s Republic party and the newly formed Impeachment bloc. Even so, Hovannisian and his team actually campaigned for the election, and despite widespread vote-buying by pro-governmental parties were actually one of only two opposition parties that made it into the current parliament on 12 May.

Raffi Hovannisian, Polling Station, Nork, Yerevan, Republic of Armenia © Onnik Krikorian/Oneworld Multimedia for EurasiaNet 2007

As is usual before presidential elections in Armenia, there are now efforts to seek putting forward Hovannisian’s candidature forwards for the presidency when the incumbent, Robert Kocharian, has to step down after serving two terms in office early next year. There’s just one problem, though. Given the amount of respect that there is for Hovannisian in Armenia, both the former and current president have made sure that the American born lawyer only received his Armenian citizenship in 2001.

Under the Armenian Constitution, presidential candidates must be citizens of Armenia and resident in the country for 10 years. This is the problem Hovannisian faced when he tried to unsuccessfully run for the 2003 presidential election.

Hovannisian was formally nominated for the Armenian presidency on Saturday by a group of 152 supporters acting with his consent. They will file for his registration with the Central Election Commission on Tuesday. The registration process promises to be a tough challenge for the former California-based lawyer given the lingering controversy surrounding his eligibility to run for president.

Under Armenian law, only those Armenian citizens who have “permanently” resided in the country for the ten previous years can be registered as presidential candidates. Hovannisian was granted Armenian citizenship only last year, several months after surrendering his U.S. passport. He argues that he is eligible to run for president because his citizenship application was delayed for many years “in violation of the law.”

“I am as eligible to take part in all electoral processes as the president of the republic and his most radical opponent,” Hovannisian had told RFE/RL in an interview last month.

However, given that the current president wasn’t, and that Heritage argues that Hovannisian’s claims for citizenship were illegally frustrated since first applying in the 1990s, it now looks as though they will again be pursuing the matter through the courts. This happened before the last presidential election in 2003 and RFE/RL reports that it looks as though it will now happen again. Much to the chagrin of many in Armenia who would likely vote for Hovannisian, it is unlikely that the courts will this time rule any different.

Hovannisian was granted Armenian citizenship by President Robert Kocharian in 2001, more than a decade after moving to Yerevan with his family from California. The government-controlled Central Election Commission cited this fact when it refused to register him as a candidate ahead of the last presidential ballot held in 2003.

Hovannisian, who had served as independent Armenia’s first foreign minister from 1991-1992, condemned the refusal as politically motivated and unlawful. He claimed that his numerous citizenship applications had for years been illegally ignored by Kocharian and his predecessor Levon Ter-Petrosian.

Senior members of Hovannisian’s Zharangutyun (Heritage) party made the same argument at a news conference on Wednesday. They said the CEC should ignore Kocharian’s 2001 decree and base its decisions on the Armenian constitution and international conventions signed by Yerevan if their leader seeks to participate in the 2008 election.

“Such decrees are trumped by international conventions ratified by the Republic of Armenia and our constitution,” said Stepan Safarian, a Zharangutyun parliamentarian. “As far as the constitution is concerned, Raffi Hovannisian has no citizenship problem.”

“If Mr. Hovannisian had not been an Armenian citizen, he would not have been able to hoist Armenia’s flag at the UN and sign inter-state agreements,” said Zaruhi Postanjian, another member of the party’s parliament caucus. “So we consider the issue solved.”

[…]

Armenian law until recently did not ban foreign nationals from working as government ministers and occupying other government posts. Some of Armenia’s ambassadors abroad still do not have Armenian citizenship.

[…]

Observers believe that the popular opposition politician will almost certainly be barred from running for president, especially considering his better-than-expected performance in the May 12 parliamentary elections. Zharangutyun became one of only two opposition groups represented in the new Armenian parliament, winning 6 percent of the vote, according to the CEC. Alleging large-scale electoral fraud, the party claims to have won three times as many votes.

The full news item is here, and an interview I conducted with Hovannisian in 2005 is here. Some photographs I took of Raffi Hovannisian and Heritage on the campaign trial for the 2007 parliamentary election are here.

Raffi Hovannisian, Polling Station, Nork, Yerevan, Republic of Armenia © Onnik Krikorian/Oneworld Multimedia for EurasiaNet 2007