In the pre-election period, the media mainly covered the activities and initiatives of the new government and its leader, holding extraordinary parliamentary elections and drafting amendments to the Electoral Code. The publications regarding the Prime Minister and the Government were mainly positive on the First Channel, Armenian Second TV Channel, Armenia, Kentron, Shant TV Companies and the 1in.am website.

Negative references dominated Yerkir Media TV and the News.am website. Moreover, in the case of Yerkir Media, the negative balance was formed at the expense of the critical statements of hence journalists.

These results were recorded during the monitoring period of the Armenian media by the Yerevan Press Club, during the period between October 16 – November 1.  

News and political programs of 6 TV companies, all the news stories of News.am and prime-time presentations of 1in.am were monitored.

TV programs which aired between the times of 18:00 – 00:00 TV were examined.

H1 mentioned these topics more frequently, whereas Shant, rarely. The higher indicators of News.am versus the comparably lower indicators of 1in.am were determined not by the difference of interests, but by the total volume of examined materials.

Unlike News.am, which most often covered he Prime Minister and the government, 1in.am’s debate programs focused on snap elections and amendments to the Electoral Code.

The sources of information were the government, the president’s staff, and local self-government bodies. The information they provided was most demanded for all mentioned channels and news.am.

Only 1in.am has touched upon the views of the expert community, which separated this media outlet for research purposes.

In the mentioned period, the media also covered the issue of amnesty and the government’s human resource policy.

Both these issues have been positive and negative, namely the appointment of Hunan Poghosyan, former Deputy Chief of Police, as the Governor of Syunik.

The graph presents the number of those materials which relate to the activities of the new government and its leader, the progress of the snap parliamentary elections and the amendments to the Electoral Code.

All the publications on the mentioned topics in their turn were distinguished by positive, negative and neutral characteristics.

Gayane Asryan