Polls prior to the vote showed the Republican Party of Armenia’s president, Serzh Sargsyan, in the lead, closely followed by a bloc led by businessman Gagik Tsarukian, one of Armenia’s richest men.
60.86% of eligible citizens of Armenia have cast their vote at the parliamentary elections, Chairman of the Central Electoral Commission of Armenia Tigran Mukuchyan told the reporters, introducing first data of participation of eligible voters.
According to the exit poll conducted by the Armenian Sociological Association and BS/The Gallup Organization the Republican Party of Armenia received 46% of votes at the parliamentary elections of April 2, Gallup representative Rasa Alisauskiene told “Yerkir Media” TV channel. He also introduced the preliminary results of the exit poll.
All the polling stations in Armenia are closed by 20:00. The parliamentary elections are over. The commissions will start counting the votes.
50.93% of eligible voters participated in Armenia’s parliamentary elections. Armen Smbatyan, CEC president secretary, told reporters in Central Electoral Commission (CEC).
Today we observe and will not make assessments on the voting process,” he said, adding that the OSCE/ODIHR accredited 300 observers for Armenia’s parliamentary election. “Our observers observe the election throughout Armenia. We are grateful to Armenia’s government and people for the warm reception,” Ignacio Sanchez Amor said.
“There is no serious reason for concern. The technical issues of equipments which happened, interested our party as well, of course. Armenia is one of the exceptional countries where a top-modern electoral system has been introduced, which is not only the best from a legal point of view, but is also rather difficult with electoral solutions. Tens of thousands devices have been installed in polling stations, and the malfunctioning of a few cannot shadow the normal process of the election.”
“Our proxies were in one of the polling stations, where cameras have been installed on the polling booths. Of course, commission members assured that they don’t work, in any case, our proxies insisted that they were eliminated. There are also calls that some people demand that people took photos of the ballots, they are being checked now.”
The European Union expects that the election in Armenia proceeds without issues and in line with democratic principles, Piotr Switalski, head of the EU delegation to Armenia, told reporters in the 9/18 polling station in the S. Spandaryan School.
Based on the results received from 2009 polling stations, the Central Electoral Commission announces that 344.714 citizens cast their votes.
