Tigran Avinyan's Institutional and Propaganda Activities are Intertwined: Daniel Ioannisyan

The mayoral candidate from the ‘Civil Contract’ faction and Deputy Mayor of Yerevan, Tigran Avinyan's participation in meetings while simultaneously conducting propaganda constitutes a use of administrative resources. This was stated by Daniel Ioannisyan, program coordinator of the ‘Civil Society Officers’ NGO and a member of the ‘Independent Observer’ civic alliance, in an interview with NEWS.am.

“From a legal perspective, there is no violation in this case; however, there is a direct issue of the use of administrative resources. Institutional and propaganda activities are mixed, and representatives of the authorities gain unfair competitive conditions. We believe that it should be established by law that institutional activities and propaganda should be incompatible,” noted Ioannisyan.

According to Ioannisyan, during the pre-election period, the observation body recorded that the media resources of the municipality and the Public Television created a competitive advantage for Tigran Avinyan. “They conducted very intensive coverage, most of which was not about institutional activities, but rather pre-election. At the same time, Public Television did not provide the same opportunity for other parties participating in the elections. When the date for the elections was confirmed, Tigran Avinyan appeared on Public Television instead of, for example, the Chairman of the Central Election Commission, which would have been more logical. And that interview was mainly about the elections,” emphasized Ioannisyan.