Taron Margaryan Assigns a New Position to the Fake Observer

Today the first session of the new City Council of Yerevan was held. At the end of the session, in response to journalists’ questions, Taron Margaryan addressed the incident related to Anna Stepanyan, who he appointed as Head of Education Department.

In particular, the Mayor said that he does not agree with the claims that Stepanyan was a fake observer during the Yerevan City Council elections. “We have provided answers and there is also an answer from the Central Electoral Commission”, Margaryan said.

It is worth reminding that during Yerevan City Council elections on May 14, Anna Stepanyan, who was then principal at Siamanto school was present in 7/20 polling station as an observer from “Education and Cultural Bridges” organization. However, Stepanyan was not accredited by the Central Electoral Commission though she had a document with CEC stamp that had her name and surname written with a pen.

Representative of “Union of Informed Citizens” NGO Daniel Ioannisyan had to call CEC Chairman Tigran Mukuchyan with the requirement to remove the fake observer from the polling station. In the end, she was finally removed from there.

Note that the names of all the observers are published in the CEC website, and Mrs. Stepanyan’s name is not there.

It is difficult to say what the statement by Taron Margaryan “We have provided answers” means, but the response of the Central Electoral Commission was definite, i.e. the fake observer was removed from the polling station.

Note that according to “Independent Observer” initiative, the observers from “Education and Cultural Bridges” were often guiding the voters to vote for the Republican Party of Armenia.