YEREVAN—Armenia’s Central Electoral Commission officially certified the results of the December 9 snap parliamentary vote, which saw Acting Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s “My Step” Alliance capture 70.4 percent of the votes.
Based on the CEC’s certified results, which are identical to ones it issued after the vote count in early morning hours of December 10,. the “My Step” alliance will hold 88 seats in the newly-configured 132-seat parliament. Businessman Gagik Tsarukian’s Prosperous Armenia Party was a distant second with 8.3 percent of the votes and will have 26 parliament seats. In third place was the Bright Armenia Party, which walked away with 6.4 percent of the votes and will occupy the remaining 18 seats in the legislature.
The CEC also confirmed that former president Serzh Sarkisian’s Republican Party of Armenia and the Armenian Revolutionary Federation did not clear the five-percent threshold to enter the parliament. They garnered 4.7 percent and 3.9 percent of the votes respectively.
Candidates, parties and alliances have until December 21 to challenge the results in an appeals process to the Constitutional Court. On Sunday, the CEC chairman Tigran Mukuchian said that it had no received any challenges.
According to Azatutyun.am, Mukuchian also told reporters that ballots have been recounted in 57 of Armenia’s 2010 electoral precincts. In 22 of them, he said, election officials detected minor violations that could not have had a major impact on the overall results.
