President Sarkissian’s Resignation Sparks Speculation, Raises More Questions

But a line from the president’s statement in particular, that “The purpose of my proposal was not to move from one form of government to another (parliamentary to semi-presidential or presidential), but to create a state system based on checks and balances” suggests that Sarkissian may not be so much pushing for a constitutional change of powers, rather than setting himself up for a potential run for the Prime Minister’s Office in 2026, where he might find the constitutional powers he was looking for.

Indeed, the President has been dropping hints about resigning for a while now, with several opinion polls showing him to be among the more popular public figures, rivaling the prime minister’s numbers. Several political commentators have pegged him as a potential candidate for last year’s election. Prof. Nerses Kopalyan, a political scientist at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, tweeted on Monday: “President Armen Sarkissian had been hinting for some time of  possibly resigning. As the domestic political landscape has relatively stabilized, he’s taken the step. Expect him to enter politics as a democratic alternative to Pashinyan. The voter base is there!” According to him, the President won a lot of political capital in the eyes of many Velvet Revolution participants who were more concerned with removing the previous regime than supporting Nikol Pashinyan. In last year’s election, Pashinyan did manage to win over 35 percent of the undecided vote, which Kopalyan describes as more of an “anti-Kocharyan vote” rather than support for him. According to him, Sarkissian could fill a void in the political spectrum which breaks the lesser-of-two-evils dichotomy by giving more urban and educated voters a more mature and experienced candidate who still respects the values of the Velvet Revolution.

While no official statement on the rumor has been made yet, the president has been dropping a lot of not-so-subtle hints that he might see himself as that person as well. In a clearly-self-promotional interview with SpectatorWorld.com appropriately titled “Will Armen Sarkissian save Armenia?”, Sarkissian was asked how one could build a nation devastated by foreign aggression and demoralized by infighting. Sarkissian was quoted as responding: “You begin by looking inwards. You ask yourself difficult questions and make necessary changes.”

Still, both the reason provided, and the circumstances of the president’s resignation have raised lingering questions. Civil rights activist Daniel Ioannisyan, who also sits on the Constitutional Amendment Committee, was perplexed by the president’s claimed dissatisfaction with the lack of powers of his office. In a media interview following the President’s resignation, Ionnisyan countered that Sarkissian seldom, if ever, used the constitutional leverages at his disposal anyway. “The only time [Sarkissian] truly attempted to use his powers to affect the political process, during the crisis of General Gasparyan’s resignation last February, his actions ended up hindering efforts to keep the Army outside of politics” Ionnisyan said, “how he would have chosen to wield his powers if he had been afforded more is anyone’s guess.”

But the most explosive theory explaining the president’s resignation — which strangely was made on a Sunday evening, while he was outside the country on leave — came in the form of a damning report by the investigative journalism platform Hetq. According to Hetq editor-in-chief Edik Baghdasaryan, Armen Sarkissian had admitted to holding citizenship of the small Caribbean island of St. Kitts and Nevis at the time he was sworn into the presidency, thus violating the Armenian constitution which requires the president to be solely a citizen of Armenia. If the president’s appointment was indeed unconstitutional, it would raise questions about the validity of all presidential decrees signed since 2018, including the appointing of the prime minister’s government. According to Hetq, “President Armen Sarkissian is unlikely to return to Armenia since he could be prosecuted for forging official documents.”