Home > 6.2 Coalitions > ARMENIA - Joint Opinion on the Draft Law on Referendum
 
 
 
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Paragraph 68
 

Citizens of Armenia, the author of the initiative for holding a referendum, political parties and alliances, and NGOs are entitled to conduct referendum campaigns (Article 17.1). Since only one party to “YES” and one party to “NO” campaign may exist with regard to each issue put to referendum (Article 17.3), only one fund for the “YES” campaign and one fund for the “NO” campaign may be set up to finance referendum campaigns (Article 19.1). According to the authorities, this regulatory approach provides for an easier distribution of public resources, such as provision of premises for campaign events (Article 18.3) and free airtime (Article 18.12). “Other persons participating in the campaign shall not have the right to create a separate fund” (Article 19.1). This could again pose a problem of freedom of expression – unless unregulated and unmonitored spending by unregistered parties is authorised, which would also be problematic. It would be advisable to require any civic or political group that wishes to campaign in a referendum separately from the two registered referendum parties, using mass media or campaign events, to set up a separate campaign fund that will be subject to the same rules as campaign funds of the referendum parties.