In Armenia an election alliance to two is not recommended

Vaհe H Apelian 

 

Courtesy OC-Media.org. 
https://oc-media.org/whos-who-in-armenias-2026-parliamentary-elections/

In the upcoming election in Armenia, Robert Kocharian led Armenia Alliance is the only alliance made up of two parties, ARF and Forward Party. This monogamous political relationship may well backfire on both and one or both of them may end up regretting forming an alliance with the other, when both could have run independently. Because when it comes to politics in Armenia, an alliance or a coalition of two, a political monogamy of sort, is not recommended. But an alliance of three or more, a political party, a political polygamy of sort, is very much recommended.

Let me explain myself and elaborate why a political alliance of two is not recommended in Armenia.

In politics, naturally a party’s voting constituent is the party’s capital to procure for itself seats for governing the country. In Armenia, thresholds for entering the government are as follows.

4% for single parties

8% for alliances of two parties

9% for three and 10% for alliances of more parties.

In Israel, the electoral threshold, that is to say the minimum share of votes required in order to have seats the Knesset, the Israeli parliament, is at least 3.25%. It used to be 1%  but was gradually raised to the current requirement of 3.25%. I do not think they have Armenia like election threshold provisions. In Turkey the threshold is 7%. It used to be 10% preventing smaller parties to have representation.

In Armenia, three or more parties forming an alliance and presenting themselves to the public as an alliance makes a lot of sense. An alliance of three parties would have needed a combined 12% of the votes to individually gain seats in the National Assembly and then form a fraction or a post-election coalition. But as an election alliance, it will only need 9% of the votes to have ideological presence in the National Assembly. An election alliance of four or more parties, look even more conducive for each, but it is not recommended as only three parties can form a post-election coalition to nominate the PM.

The problem with the parties that do not meet the threshold is that, the votes cast for them will be absorbed by the winning parties/alliances. Thus, in fact they end up forfeiting their political capital. During 2021 June snap general election, 26 political entities took part in the election. Only two passed the threshold. Nikol Pashinyan led the Civil Contact at 53.95%, and Robert Kocharian led Armenia Alliance that had 21.11% of the votes. Even Serzh Sargsyan/Artur Venetsyan led I Have Honor Alliance had only 5.22% but got seat because of the law that mandates at least 3 political entities (party/alliance), in the National Assembly. The combined votes of these three parties/Alliances, amount to 80% of the votes. The remaining 24 parties had a total of 20% of the votes which were absorbed by the winning three parties in the National Assembly.

However, an Alliance of two does not make sense at all. 

I have Kocharian’s Armenia Alliance in mind. During June 2021 general snap election, Kocharian’s Armenia Alliance was made up of three parties. They were ARF, Reborn Armenia and One Armenia. These three parties forming an alliance under the leaderships of Robert Kocharian made sense for the reasons given above. 

But during the upcoming June 7, 2026 election, Armenia Alliance led by Robert Kocharian is made up of two parties, ARF and Forward Party. The Alliance has to secure 8% of the votes to get seats in the National Assembly. Which means that each of them has to contribute at least 4% of the votes, per election requirement for a party, to come up with the required 8% for the alliance.  Otherwise, it would mean that one of the two is benefiting from the political popularity of the other and will remain politically indebted and subordinate.

Each of these two parties, ARF and Forward Party, was more likely to have gotten 4% of the votes on their own, and gotten seats in the National Assembly and then formed a post-election parliamentary fraction; instead of each one of them tying their election  fortunes to 8% threshold to have seats. 

An alliance of two would make sense if a voter, who would not have wanted to vote to either one of them, decides to vote for them as a single entity. I do not think that is a realistic  or reasonable expectation from a voting public.