YEREVAN. – The phenomenon of the Prosperous Armenia Party (PAP) is very interesting, stated capital city Yerevan’s Caucasus Institute Director, political scientist Alexander Iskandaryan, during Thursday’s Armenian-Russian television conference.   

In his words, Armenia’s May 6 parliamentary elections revealed an interesting picture: the country’s large political parties grew larger, whereas the small parties grew even smaller.

Iskandaryan noted that paternalism is “sold” well, whereas ideology is “sold” poorly in countries like Armenia.

“Those parties, which had built their [pre-election] campaign on the battle of ideas, lost,” the analyst noted, and added that the ruling Republican Party’s main challenger in the elections was the PAP, not the opposition, and the opposition bloc Armenian National Congress’ main opponents were the other opposition forces.