“The Armenian government cannot be democratic without women” open letter to Pashinyan

Shushan Avagyan, a lecturer and translator from the American University of Armenia, has sent an open letter to Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan expressing concern that women in the newly formed government are almost absent (two female ministers). In her conviction, the government of the Republic of Armenia without the presence or representation of women cannot be “democratic “. Here is an open letter …

Dear Nikol Pashinyan,

It is 5:31 am  and  I cannot sleep, though I would like to sleep quietly. So I decided to write to you a very simple letter, since the Facebook wall is flooded with references of women to you (apparently their rage and frustration has not yet reached you). The scriptures are different- short, long, dialectical, informal, Armenian, English and Russian, but all are alarmed and questioned. “There are no women in the new government of the Republic of Armenia. Where are women?”…

I think it is unnecessary to stress once again (many times it has been emphasized and said) that when you and your fighters called the people, they unanimously and immediately responded to you, and when the crowd came out to the street, either on the frontline or the walking around the edges with posters, there were many  girls and women among them. The masses were mixed up and legitimate, and you were supported by both girls and boys, women and men.

They were students and teachers, professors, doctors, housekeepers, taxi drivers, factory workers, mothers and fathers, war veterans, grandmothers and grandfathers. Together, they all unitedly wanted a change so that their lives would no longer be the same, for the immediate end of the injustice in the Republic and to regain their dignity, being conscious, responsible, independent and active citizens.

Most of the girls and women in politics were politicized and they politicized many others  signaling the movement like waves, flooding and closing the streets, loudly agitating on social networks, multiplying their numbers. They did not screw up when messages from girls and women were not heard from the stage (though many of the speeches heard by boys and men) did not shrink when they were called by “guys” and “brothers” (for the sake of “brotherhood”), though they were eager to hear , as bright evidence, that they are seen (and not unnoticed), respected (and not neglected), loved (and not used), and called  “girls”, “women “, “sisters”. They trusted in the calls for justice, love and tolerance that you and your fighters sounded on the streets and on the square. But now, at least at the time of writing, justice seems to be violated, the majority of the people representing the government, 23 to 21 are male, while there are many women with higher education, with great work experience, who want to are ready to work.

Girls and women are not minorities in the Republic of Armenia. If they are not majority, at least they make half of the population. As girls and women wanted to become part of a velvet revolution, wishing to see changes in their lives, women want and should become part of our country’s reconstruction work and should be proportionately represented in the government. This is at least normal and fair.

We must be equally represented in the new government. We also want to build our present and future. We also want and demand  possibility to make decisions. The Government of the Republic of Armenia cannot be  democratic without our presence and representation.

I also call on the members of the “Yelq” faction and demand (as I gave them my vote for the 2017 parliamentary elections), join this call.

Dear Nikol, for the sake of your three daughters, who make up majority of your family, for my five-month-old daughter, who, I am sure, will want to grow up in a fair Armenia, open the government’s figurative doors and invite women, so that we can exercise our right to build our country and lead our people to the better future.