A senior member of the My Step bloc, which is dominated by the ruling Civil Contract party and controls Yerevan’s municipal council, said it is seeking a vote of no confidence in Marutian.
“According to preliminary information, we already have 39 signatures [of council members,] more than the 33 signatures necessary [for a no confidence motion,]” Armen Kotolian told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service.
“The process has started, and I think that Hayk Marutian will be dismissed before the end of this month,” he said.
Kotolian declined to give reasons for the dramatic move, saying that My Step will explain it later on.
The city council is empowered to appoint and dismiss mayors. My Step controls 54 of its 65 seats.
A spokesman for Marutian said he has not been notified about the ruling team’s decision to oust him and will not comment on it for now.
Marutian, 45, is a former TV comedian who actively participated in the “velvet revolution” that brought Pashinian to power in May 2018. He was handpicked by Pashinian to lead My Step’s list of candidates in the last municipal elections held in September 2018 and won by the pro-government bloc.
Marutian famously declared during the mayoral race that Armenia’s political landscape consists of only “whites” allied to Pashinian and “blacks” symbolizing darkness and challenging the prime minister.
Relations between the two men deteriorated after Armenia’s defeat in last year’s war with Azerbaijan that sparked anti-government protests in Yerevan. Marutian increasingly distanced himself from Pashinian’s team in the following months and pointedly declined to support it in the run-up to snap parliamentary elections held in June.
A top aide to Pashinian publicly criticized the mayor’s stance shortly after the vote. Some media outlets reported at the time that the prime minister is now considering replacing Marutian.
In a further sign of rising tension between the two men, the Haykakan Zhamanak daily belonging to Pashinian’s family claimed at the weekend that Marutian has defected to the Armenian opposition and even secretly met with former President Robert Kocharian.
Marutian’s press secretary, Hakob Karapetian, flatly denied such a meeting on Wednesday. Earlier this week, Karapetian referred to Pashinian’s paper as “the yellow press.”
According to Kotolian, Armenia’s leadership is considering several potential candidates for the post of Yerevan mayor, including Marutian’s deputy Hayk Sargsian.