From 21 to 31 May, 2019, the “Media Advocate” initiative followed online media reports on the wife of the Prime Minister of the Republic of Armenia, Anna Hakobyan’s personality and activities.
34 leading Armenian news agencies have been monitored.
In the specified period, 383 articles were declared, 68 of which were negative, 43 were positive and 271 were neutral.
The difference between the positive and negative articles on the Wife of the Prime Minister of the Republic of Armenia, Mrs. Anna Hakobyan during this ten-day period is not so vivid, but the negative articles continue to prevail. An important article on Anna Hakobyan may be considered the one covering her visit: Anna Hakobyan visited Levon, a draft-age boy who has a health problems. Negative articles contain a number of criticisms addressed to “My Step” and “City of Smiles” charitable foundations.
Anna Hakobyan is accused of not supporting the soldiers and children, and this time those who needed such kind of assistance, were not advised to go to “Tsarukyan Foundation” as they were during the previous ten-day period, but were asked to apply to the Ministry of Health. Then Mrs. Hakobyan’s remarks were criticized: “If those people somehow own that money, it will not be more helpful if it is kept by them, rather than if it is given to us,” she said. The news outlets reported that the prime minister’s wife “creates a “purgatory” for the non-clean money” and “legitimizes the robbed money.”
Anna Hakobyan did not consider the question asked by an Azerbaijani journalist in Almaty city as provocative. Facebook users did not agree with Anna Hakobyan, in particular, Toros Aleksanyan wrote: “Anna Hakobyan considers this issue normal, so we may assume that she agrees with the Azerbaijani and, according to her logic, she thinks that her son has no right to serve in Artsakh, and the Armenian prime minister, in his turn, has no right to visit there. ”
Anna Hakobyan currently has an actual conflict with the public, in the context of discussions on the charity fund and the Artsakh issue. Actually, Anna Hakobyan expresses thoughts that sometimes contradict the Prime Minister’s actions.
