Residents of the Armenian capital will to go the polls to elect a new municipal assembly that will in turn appoint the city’s mayor.
The last mayor, Hrachya Sargsian, stepped down on March 17 after only 15 months in office. Yerevan has since been effectively run by Tigran Avinian, a deputy mayor nominated by the ruling Civil Contract party for the vacant post.
Avinian has kept a high profile for the last three months, chairing meetings with municipal officials, issuing instructions to them and talking to ordinary citizens. Critics accuse him of abusing his position to prematurely conduct his election campaign. The 34-year-old vice-mayor allied to Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian has dismissed these claims.
“Convincing the people of Yerevan that you really deserve [to become mayor] is a very difficult task,” he told reporters last month.
It remains unclear whether Avinian and the ruling party will be challenged by any of the two opposition alliances represented in the Armenian parliament. Senior members of the Hayastan and Pativ Unem alliances told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service that they have not even discussed their participation in the polls so far.
Avinian would also face a serious challenge from Hayk Marutian, whom Pashinian’s political team had installed as mayor after winning the overwhelming majority of seats in the city council in 2018. The council ousted Marutian in December 2021 after he fell out with the prime minister.
During his ouster Marutian accused Armenia’s current leaders of betraying the goals of the 2018 “velvet revolution” that brought them to power. The former TV comedian, who appears to remain popular with many Yerevan voters, has not yet announced plans to join the mayoral race.
About a dozen other figures mostly representing fringe parties are expected to enter the fray. One of those parties, Aprelu Yerkir, is reportedly sponsored by Ruben Vardanyan, a wealthy businessman and philanthropist who moved to Nagorno-Karabakh last September.
Earlier this week, Aprelu Yerkir nominated Mane Tandilian, its chairwoman and a former labor minister in Pashinian’s government, as its mayoral candidate. Tandilian claimed that she is aiming for “resounding victory” in the municipal elections which she said would amount to a vote of no confidence in Pashinian’s administration.