The more or less calm of the recent election campaign cycle in Armenia is a result of the news coverage policy of the TV stations in Armenia.

The stations have followed the rules for the most part and have provided equal time to all political forces in the race. As to whether the parties have been able to utilize these resources is less dependent on the stations than the financial and creative possibilities of the parties themselves.

The political parties behind the pack, Armenian National Congress, ARF and United Armenians, in contrast to the others, have only used the free campaign time allotted them given their limited resources.

In contrast to the last nationwide election, when the TV stations employed a policy of exemption and clear differentiation treatment, resulting in unequal conditions, this time a preferential policy is in use. Those parties, Prosperous Armenia, ARF and the Republican Party, who have direct or indirect influence on TV stations, Kentron, Yerkir Media and Public TV respectively, have come out better this time around in terms of quantity and content.

Their desire to be more comprehensive in news coverage is observable but not very stressed in the general picture. Despite this, the fact that Public TV covered the president’s working visits to the regions in the same breath as the Republican Party’s election campaign, opened the way for greater air time for the authorities. This was a very subtle and crafty propaganda device. The same can be said for the TV references to the agricultural charity dished out by Gagik Tsarukyan’s foundation.
Even though Prosperous Armenia argues that these charity works have nothing to do with the party’s campaign, this is just a cover. For starters the president of the foundation just happens to be the president of the party who is personally on the campaign stump.
One of the most positive aspects of the TV coverage is that the stations have refrained from counter-campaigning. The stations have been opened to the opposition forces outside the realm of mere political ads and news reports, and have been allowed other venues to get their message across to the public.

At the same time, the stations have refrained from painting the opposition in negative tones and have basically stuck to the facts on the ground in the election campaign.

Despite this positive change, the activity of the TV stations was coupled with negative aspects as well.

1. The electronic media has yet again failed to serve as a platform for political dialogue and debate. With some exceptions, they did not attempt to formulate a culture of debate. The stations failed to organize debates amongst the candidates. For one, candidates in single mandate races avoided debating at all costs, even though at the start of the campaign the Republican Party and the Armenian National Congress, diametrically opposed forces, threw down the debate gloves. There was only one debate between Samvel Farmanyan and Vladimir Karapetyan, candidates in Election District #2, which appeared on ArmNews. While far from a civilized debate, it was at least an attempt.

What is more interesting is the fact that, with the exception of the ARF, none of the contesting political forces expressed a desire to debate. The ruling Republican Party, from the get-go, adopted a no-debate policy. In reality, this was a convenient way to avoid any responsibility before the voters.

Then too, the TV stations failed to organize any such debates, except for Yerkir Media, ArmNews, and, to a lesser extent, Kentron TV.

2. TV coverage in the main was restricted to coverage of the campaign stops and the speeches made during the stump. In terms of content and specifics, such publicity events had little to impart to voters other than generalities and emotional exhortations.

Watching Armenian TV voters were merely informed about where a certain party was campaigning on a particular day and what the party spokesperson told the crowd.

This was the extent of the coverage, leaving voters in the lurch as to voting decisions. The TV stations, by following such a policy, did little to create an environment in which the public demanded more from the candidates.

3. Two stations, ArmNews and Shant, stood out with conducting and ordering elections polls. They presented the polls as a great way to get a handle on the mod of the people, the average voters on the ground. But it remained a mystery for the public as to how these financially strapped stations could afford such costly polling actions.

When it became clear that more or less credit worthy international pollsters conducted such surveys via discredited local organizations and poll takers, their results created more doubts than anything else.

Such surveys conducted by the TV stations were simply an attempt to create the illusion of objectivity and became a tool to illicit support for the ruling party. This work had more to do with the public’s sub-consciousness than its consciousness.

This is propaganda of a different sort; a highly specialized way of getting voters to lean this way or that. Whether it is moral and falls within the purview of TV stations, is another matter for discussion.