Armenia’s Governance System Has to Change

 

Missing from the postcard are soldiers killed in the army at peacetime and their mourning mothers, the military doctor killed in broad daylight in the restaurant and his orphaned children, the suicides because people can't cope with a cruel reality anymore. The abandoned villages and towns, the unprotected and vulnerable senior citizens, the lacerated forests and mountains, mineral waste dumps, the ruined agriculture, the insecure life of the fearful, those in despair, the emigration, the crime statistics, the absence of justice and the rule of law…all are covered or erased.

The above lack of security in our lives runs parallel to the cooperation of the new colonialists and the domestic criminal oligarchic system.

 

Our society has traditionally believed that the state should dictate the lives of its citizens. For most Armenians the state is an invisible body, with supreme authority, to govern any way it wants. In fact, a state is just a mechanism through which people are guaranteed security and development. States are established and formed to serve their citizens and to give an adequate response to the challenges faced by its people.



What’s going on in our country? Does our state take care of its people? Has it established an honorable or respectable life for its citizens?

The state should guarantee the security of its people, starting with military security, security of culture, financial-economic security, and security in foreign affairs, etc. But every day we witness how the fake balloons of those securities keep exploding around us.

 

What are the conclusions to be drawn from this state of affairs? Of course, it's the absence of the state. Actually, we haven’t had a state for a long time. The current state serves and protects only the oligarchic clans. It serves the elite and the foreign political power centres. And in response, those centres protect today’s fake and subservient statesmen and politicians. This is the primitive mechanism through which the management of our country has been handed to the new colonialists. The management levers are no longer in Armenia. They are in the hands of the new colonialists who have become the decision-makers of our country.

 

Worried with the above-mentioned, 33 citizens united and established a political-civil action group called Nakhakhorhrdaran. The group initiated new political process aimed at changing of the management system in Armenia.



Nakhakhorhrdaran aims to establish a new system capable to set and to pursue national goals and tasks. We call on Republic of Armenia citizens and all Armenians living in the Diaspora to stand up for the human, national and state dignity, freedom and justice in our Homeland. We call on all Diaspora Armenians to participate in the necessary process with Armenians living in Motherland, because the current management system has created a crisis of moral-psychological, socio-economic and demographic character which is threatening the existence of our Motherland.



The deepening crisis is reflected in the enforcement of the criminal oligarchic value system on society, by the social polarization incompatible with a vibrant social life, by the legal system which is a satellite of the political powers, by the predatory exploitation of natural resources, the destruction of the natural systems and biodiversity, by the pulverization of the cultural heritage, by Armenia's increasing dependence on foreign powers.



Today’s systemic crisis has caused widespread despair toward the future resulting in colossal emigration which threatens not only the statehood, but also the physical existence of the Armenians living in the Homeland.

 

We believe it is possible to overcome the systemic crisis through radical reconsideration and through the transformation of the current political and management systems. In such a situation the mobilization of the capable forces of society and the support and mobilization of Diaspora Armenians is a must. We are in active struggle now, organizing demonstrations, public actions, etc. We are also working to establish an alternative court of justice. New Armenia's Strategic Concept, prepared by Nakhakhorhrdaran, shall start its hearings in September. Many Armenians from Diaspora visit our office in Armenia and take part in the discussions of the concept and our activities in general. Their suggestions are always taken into consideration.

Dear Brothers and Sisters, it is high time to be active in these processes and to show that you are not indifferent to what is happening to Armenia, to our Motherland. The desire for change is well planted in the country, and many youth groups have stood up and made their demands for a just society. The Diaspora should take active part in these processes. The Diaspora should join the processes in any way they prefer. Diaspora should make its voice heard. Tomorrow might be too late.