Yerevan Press Club disseminated the summary of Armenian media monitoring results for March 4-5, 2003.
Monitoring of Armenian media coverage of campaigning for RA presidential elections in 2003 was made by Yerevan Press Club under the project supported by the Open Society Institute. Assistance in the YPC monitoring was provided by "Asparez" Journalists’ Club of Gyumri, the Vanadzor branch of Helsinki Citizens Assembly and Internews public organization.
Herein the findings of the quantitative monitoring of March 4-5, 2003 are summarized (for TV and radio channels – till 20.00 on the ballot day) – the period when the pre-election promotion is prohibited by the law. During these two days the monitoring group studied all the newscasts and analytical programs of 5 TV and 1 radio channels, as well as 7 newspapers in full. The monitoring was aimed at calculation of the volume (air time/newspaper space), allocated to the presidency candidates to express attitudes, opinions and judgments, as well as for narrations about them made by other individuals. Along with this, the mentionings of candidates were counted, with a specification of the contexts – positive, negative and neutral.
1. The activities of the majority of media on March 4-5 were affected by the intensification of the political discord in the period between the two rounds of voting. During these days the media mostly remained divided into two major wings – those of pro-Kocharyan and pro-Demirchyan standing. At the same time, the media secured themselves against the possible charges of law violations and used the implicit forms of promoting their chosen candidate while diminishing his opponent.
2. This was manifest, in particular, with regard to the newspaper coverage of the pre-election rallies held on March 3 by the two rivaling parties. On the one hand, positive or negative mentionings of candidates were practically inexistent, but on the other – the stories were presented in a manner that benefited one of the candidates with relevant accentuation made.
3. The incumbent President Robert Kocharyan received the most attention in "Azg" daily and the programs of Public Television of Armenia. In the other media (including the Public Radio) the attention was rather equally distributed. In "Hayastani Hanrapetutiun" daily the opposition candidate Stepan Demirchyan was never mentioned during the two days, yet, Robert Kocharian was mentioned only in two publications himself, one of them being an official communication (the meeting with Belarus Ambassador).
4. The majority of connotationally colored mentionings (either in definitely positive or negative context) was also recorded in the programs of the Public Television of Armenia. The incumbent was mentioned here positively six times. The other media had a significant prevalence of neutral pieces. One positive mentioning of Robert Kocharyan was recorded by the monitoring group on "Prometheus" TV company and "Azg" newspaper, each. No definitely negative mentionings were registered. Thus, March 4 and 5 gave the voters certain time "to recover" – after the flows of anti-advertising pouring on them on the last days of the second round campaign.
