Way Out Alliance


The Way Out Alliance or Yelk Alliance or simply Yelk or Way Out was a liberal political alliance of three political parties in Armenia: Civil Contract, Bright Armenia and the Hanrapetutyun Party. It was formed on 12 December 2016, before the 2017 Armenian parliamentary election. Its leaders were Edmon Marukyan, Nikol Pashinyan and Aram Sargsyan. It was dissolved on 12 September 2018 after its constituent parties agreed to participate in the 2018 parliamentary elections separately.

History

On 2 April 2017 the alliance participated in the 2017 Armenian parliamentary election with Edmon Marukyan as the leader of the alliance and won 9 seats out of 105 in National Assembly. Prior to the election, the Union for National Self-Determination, another Pro-European democratic party also wished to join the Way Out Alliance, however their request was never responded too.
After parliamentary elections the party participated in the 2017 Yerevan City Council election. The alliance's candidate for the Mayor of Yerevan was Nikol Pashinyan. However the alliance won only 14 seats out of 65 in the Yerevan City Council and Nikol Pashinyan gave up his mandate of City Council and continued his work in National Assembly as an MP.
The alliance did not participate in the 2018 Yerevan City Council election. Bright Armenia and the Hanrapetutyun Party formed another alliance - Bright Alliance. Meanwhile, Civil Contract formed the My Step Alliance with Mission Party. My Step Alliance won the elections and their candidate Hayk Marutyan was appointed as the Mayor of Yerevan, while Bright Alliance came in third in the elections and won 3 seats out of 65 in the Yerevan City Council.

Ideology

The Way Out Alliance's ideology is based on liberalism. The three parties, especially Bright Armenia and Hanrapetutyun are considerably pro-European and support Armenia's European integration. In terms of Foreign relations of Armenia, the alliance states that Armenia's decision to join the Eurasian Economic Union was wrong and had a negative impact on the country. The alliance proposed to renegotiate with the EU on signing an Association Agreement along with a Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreement.

Composition

Electoral record

Parliamentary elections

Local elections

Yerevan City Council elections