Six political parties and three alliances have entered the race for the upcoming municipal election in Gyumri, Armenia’s second-largest city, set for March 30. Voters will elect a new city council, which will then appoint the mayor.
Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s Civil Contract party faces a tough battle to maintain its grip on Gyumri’s municipal government—control it seized just three months ago in what critics call a politically motivated power play.
The snap election follows the abrupt and unexplained resignations last October of Gyumri Mayor Vardges Samsonyan, his deputies, and city council members affiliated with a local political bloc opposed to Pashinyan’s administration. Their departures came in the wake of criminal charges against businessman Samvel Balasanyan, the bloc’s unofficial leader.
Now living in the United States, Balasanyan has remained silent on the allegations. Opposition leaders, however, suspect that Pashinyan orchestrated the legal case to install a loyal mayor in Gyumri. The government denies the claim.
In December, the Armenian government appointed Sarik Minasyan, Civil Contract’s mayoral candidate, as interim mayor. Since then, opposition groups and some media outlets have accused Minasyan of using his official position to gain an unfair electoral advantage—an allegation Pashinyan’s team rejects.
Civil Contract faces a diverse field of challengers, including well-known local figures such as former Mayor Vartan Ghukasyan, Gyumri-based MP Martun Grigoryan, television producer Ruben Mkhitaryan, and businessman Karen Simonyan.
All four have ruled out forming a coalition with Pashinyan’s party. Mkhitaryan, who has a sizable social media following, voiced confidence earlier this week that Gyumri’s next mayor will come from the opposition.
“How can an Armenian guy form a coalition with them [Civil Contract] just for positions or money?” Ghukasyan remarked. The former mayor, who governed Gyumri from 1999 to 2012, has ramped up his criticism of the government since being detained by police without charge on February 20.
Minasyan, meanwhile, argues that Gyumri’s electorate will reject his main opponents, whom he links to former Presidents Serzh Sargsyan and Robert Kocharyan.
“The people remember, and they will make the right choice,” he told reporters.
Analysts believe Civil Contract is unlikely to secure an outright majority in the new city council, meaning Minasyan may need a coalition partner to remain mayor. The Euro Alliance—a coalition of several pro-Western political groups—is seen as the most likely ally.
While Euro Alliance leaders have not explicitly endorsed a deal with Civil Contract, one of them, Aram Sargsyan, played a key role in helping Pashinyan’s party install Tigran Avinyan as Yerevan’s mayor following the September 2023 municipal elections.
Suren Surenyants, leader of the opposition Democratic Alternative party, accused the Euro Alliance of disguising itself as an opposition force to win over disillusioned voters—only to hand their votes to Civil Contract’s candidate.
“Through this alliance, the authorities are trying to replicate in Gyumri the same manipulative model that kept Civil Contract in power in Yerevan,” Surenyants charged.
As election day approaches, the battle for Gyumri is shaping up to be a critical test for Pashinyan’s ruling party—and a potential turning point for Armenia’s political landscape.
