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Head of the Yelk faction of the Armenian parliament Lena Nazaryan officially presented the faction’s candidate for prime minister Nikol Pashinyan for the first round of election of PM at today’s regular session, stressing the nomination is just a formality.

“This is done to fully comply with the constitutional procedure. There is no need to present the activity of the candidate since he is well known to all,” the MP said.

Addressing the parliament, acting PM Pashinyan underlined the formal nature of his nomination as well.

“I have been nominated for not being elected, thus the National Assembly shouldn’t vote for me. The aim of the nomination is to ensure the legality of the upcoming parliamentary elections,” he said. “There are no doubts that we will hold snap parliamentary elections in December as a final victory of the April-May revolution.”

Pashinyan next talked about the political situation created in Armenia during the past five months, stressing that what had happened in Armenia was a revolution, not just a shift of power as some claim.

“It’s definite for me that a revolution did happen in Armenia, since a real change in the formation of the society took place. This is an urgent topic in a sense that there are some politicians and analysts who claim that Armenia just saw a power change, rather than a revolution. In fact, the truth is the contrary: a revolution took place in Armenia, but a change of power has not taken place yet, at least a full change of power,” he stressed.

He reminded that after he took the PM’s office numerous criminal cases have been initiated against dozens of present or former officials on charges of power abuse, bribery or appropriation. “For a long time I couldn’t understand how it could occur to an official to take bribes or make an embezzlement after April-May 2018, moreover, months or even days after the revolution. Can you imagine there is an official who takes a bribe just 15-20 days after the revolution?” he said, adding signals have been sent and continue to be sent to the old administration that what had happened in Armenia has a prospect of several months.  

According to the acting PM, it is all an attempt to create obstacles for his government and take a revenge, with the first case being an attempt to consolidate around ex-president Robert Kocharyan, the second being the October 2 case regarding the amendments in the parliament’s rules of procedure and the third one boycotting the vote on amendments to the new Electoral Code.

Pashinyan resigned as PM on October 16 to pave way for dissolution of the parliament and conduct of early elections.

Under the Armenian law, the National Assembly can be dissolved only if the prime minister resigns and lawmakers twice fail to elect his or her replacement within two weeks.