YEREVAN. – “Where are those 70-80 percent votes, which some presidential candidates [of Armenia] were claiming and accusing us, sociologists, of falsifying [public] surveys?” sociologist Aharon Adibekyan asked at the start of a press conference on Wednesday.   

In his words, it would have been good if those presidential contenders—namely, opposition Heritage Party Chairman and former FM Raffi Hovannisian, National Accord party Chairman Aram Harutyunyan, and National Self-Determination Union Chairman Paruyr Hayrikyan—had attended this press conference.     

Reflecting on a variety of opinion polls that were conducted in Armenia by Gallup Organization and TNC Opinion, Adibekyan noted that the predictions of these sociological centers came more than true, as the winner of Monday’s presidential race was the ruling Republican Party leader and incumbent President Serzh Sargsyan, and the runner-up was Raffi Hovannisian.    

To note, in an earlier news conference, Adibekyan had predicted 21 percent for Hovannisian, in the case when he garnered close to 37 percent in the actual voting, and 72 percent for Sargsyan, who actually received 58 percent on Monday.

Photo by Arsen Sargsyan/NEWS.am