Nikol Pashinyan the democratic dictator

Ergo, Armenia will not extend the state of emergency any longer. Instead, it will declare a lockdown, and the opportunity to declare a lockdown is prescribed by the package of laws adopted by the National Assembly. At first sight, this legislative amendment leaves the impression of mitigation, but in reality, the content is just the opposite — instead of the states of emergencies that the government used to declare on a monthly basis, based on the new legislative amendments, now the government has the opportunity to declare a lockdown for, attention — a period of six months, with the possibility of further extension.

Moreover, based on the legislative amendments, which contain rather abstruse provisions, the opportunity to declare a lockdown shall be granted to all government entities, starting from the government and ending with the heads of local self-government bodies.

Basically, in reality, these legislative amendments are not comparative mitigation of the regime of state of emergency, but just the opposite — the legislative amendments serve as tools that provide the government with the opportunity to have unlimited and total control and call this a lockdown.

It is clear that these legislative amendments are politically motivated and can, in the near future and at any moment, be used to control and prevent first and foremost potential and politically motivated protests, actions of the opposition and citizens’ protests and demonstrations. However, these legislative amendments are an expression of not only and perhaps not so much the realities or purposes deriving from the current political situation.

In reality, this initiative for total lockdown, or, the same as the initiative that provides the opportunity to control the country uncontrollably, is the political diagnosis of the incumbent authorities and more specifically Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, who is implementing the following well-known proposition: “A government perverts, and an absolute government perverts absolutely”.

In practice, Pashinyan has unlimited and, most importantly, uncontrollable power, and these legislative amendments merely serve as an example of the spread of absolute power over the whole republic and enshrinement of the spread of absolute power. In practice, Pashinyan has absolute and uncontrollable power since there is no mechanism for checks and balances. The National Assembly does not perform this function, the parliamentary opposition restricts implementation of this mission with pathetic rhetoric, and extra-parliamentary entities lack functional capacities for balancing.

In practice, there are no balances within the cabinet of Pashinyan. There is no government official who has the ability or capability to oppose him in regard to any issue. The government of Pashinyan is a government of one person and one figure. Just remove Nikol Pashinyan from the peak of the pyramid of his very own government, and that pyramid will collapse like a sandcastle. However, as long as he remains at the peak, he will exercise absolute power, that is, the power that is on the brink of becoming absolutely perverted. Democracy is a viable system only when the government formed within the framework of that system has active mechanisms for checks and balances. If the government does not have those active mechanisms, after a short while, the naturally democratic government turns into a dictatorship, and a democratic dictatorship at that.

Democratic dictator — this is how one can really describe the power of Nikol Pashinyan. To be more honest, this is the real diagnosis.

Harutyun Avetisyan