YEREVAN. – Armenia’s Central Electoral Commission (CEC) received, on Wednesday morning, the National Assembly (NA) record on termination of opposition Heritage Party Chairman, NA MP Raffi Hovannisian’s parliamentary mandate, CEC Press Secretary Hermine Harutyunyan told Armenian News-NEWS.am.

She added that, pursuant to the Election Code, CEC will convene a session within one week, accept the aforesaid record, and give the vacant mandate to the next candidate in Heritage’s proportional election list, that is, to Tevan Poghosyan—and no later than October 10—, unless he submits a formal petition to withdraw his candidacy prior to that.         

As Armenian News-NEWS.am informed earlier, Hovannisian had submitted a formal petition to give up his parliamentary mandate and NA Speaker Hovik Abrahamyan had announced it during the NA session. And, in line with NA procedures, if Hovannisian did not withdraw his petition within fifteen days after its publicizing in the NA session, his petition was to be automatically approved and his parliamentary mandate was to be removed. And those fifteen days have expired.

Raffi Hovannisian was elected MP from Heritage’s proportional election list which he headed. 

Photo by Sona Barseghyan