Serzh Sargsyan most frequently mentioned candidate in mass media

“Traditionally, the interest in the presidential election in Armenia starts long before the start of official election campaigns so we began our monitoring on October 1,” Chairman of the Yerevan Press Club Boris Navasardian told reporters today, when presenting an interim report on monitoring of the 2013 presidential elections’ coverage by Armenia’s broadcast media from October 1 to December 15, 2012.

He said their monitoring revealed that the mass media did not display bias or discrimination against any presidential candidate.

“President Serzh Sargsyan ranks first as the most frequently mentioned candidate in the mass media, Raffi Hovannisian is in 4th place, Hrant Bagratian in 19th,” Navasardian said.

Six national television channels, namely Public Television of Armenia, Armenia, Yerkir Media, Kentron, Shant, ArmeNews, and Second Armenian Channel were monitored.

According to Navasardian, the broadcast media paid most attention to those possible candidates who later withdrew their candidacies.

“ArmNews Channel paid the greatest attention to the possible candidates. It is followed by Public Radio and Armradio,” the speaker noted.

Five political forces – Republican Party of Armenia (HHK), Prosperous Armenia Party (BHK), Armenian National Congress (HAK), ARF-Dashnaktsutyun, and Heritage Party were the center of Armenian broadcast media’s attention.

“The distribution of media attention among five leading parties can be described as relatively proportionate,” B. Navasardian said.