Now Today's Opposition is Destitute: Alen Simonian

There is a good film titled 'The Crown of the Russian Empire', which says, 'Colonel Kudasov is destitute.' Now today's opposition is destitute. This was stated today by National Assembly Speaker Alen Simonian during his speech at the announcement hour in the National Assembly.

'People, I apologize, but politically you have exhausted yourselves, because I listened to all of your speeches and there is no political discourse. You have been saying the same things for five years and unfortunately, to your joy, your rhetoric has exhausted itself; you are no longer dictating the agenda, you are not shaping it, and you will not be able to shape it either,' he said.

He referenced a proposal made by MP Mamikjanyan regarding amnesty. 'As far as I understand, its importance is conditioned on the assumption that if an amnesty is granted, some of their former colleagues may fall under that amnesty. If the proposal is related to that, I reserve the right to say no, there will be no such amnesty,' he stated.

Alen Simonian addressed opposition MP Agnesa Khachumyan. 'I spoke solely to respond to Ms. Khachumyan, because she talked about Mr. Aghapayev's letter but did not read it to the end; I will conclude reading Aghapayev's letter, which he wrote,' he added.

Simon added, 'I have hinted all these months about the reason for his certain failures, which concerns Bishop Bagrat. Now I can perhaps state more explicitly that the main reason is the shadow and specter of former presidents; Bishop Bagrat cannot free himself from those specters, and the authors of those specters must announce their departure and truly leave. The salvation of the homeland requires this, and if they do not do this, then they are not thinking about the salvation of the homeland. They are thinking about returning to power or, so to speak, maintaining the authority of the opposition.'

He further commented on their upcoming visit, questioning why they do not communicate their concerns, stating: 'This person is in distress.' Of course, he has the right to express an opinion, and again and again, I sincerely, don't know, there will be elections soon in eight months; have you thought about what rhetoric you will go with? I know there are some things, there are discussions, some groups are moving; the Dashnaktsutyun will go separately, some group will go separately, some people will enter the party newly. The issue is not the party or the person; the issue is the discourse, your discourse, which you have today, no longer exists and is not on the agenda. Think about this, because I really want us to have a normal opposition in the next National Assembly,' he concluded.