After weeks of tensions and massive public protests across Armenia, things appear to be calming down, at least until May 8, when it is expected that parliament will vote for the opposition leader Nikol Pashinyan as the country’s new prime minister. 

Doors for that move were open after the long-time leader Serzh Sargsyan from the Republican Party of Armenia, stepped down after huge countrywide protests.

I went to one of Yerevan’s middle class neighborhoods to meet Garegin Davtyan and Sose Ghadyan. They are a young couple in their late twenties, that were married just a few months ago. Both are computer programmers and at the same time political activists that have struggled for years to change the order of things in Armenia. 

They showed me photos of them at the latest protests that gripped Yerevan for weeks. But for them, being part of an anti-establishment movement is not something new, as Garegin told me:

"We had protests in Armenia long before these latest ones. Those were motivated by a variety of local problems and issues, but none of them demanded a change of power. They had a more social character with requests for changing of tariffs or taxes. And we were among those who raised their voices and didn’t want to accept the government policies.”

But this time, after the public call that came from the former journalist and now opposition leader Pashinyan, they’ve decided that the time for change of power is now. 

Garegin’s wife Sose was very passionate when explaining her motives for joining the protests.

"For me this was the struggle for justice. Until now, laws in Armenia served not the society but the interests of those in power. That group has custom made laws to suit them the best. For me that was the struggle for justice and equality,” Sose said. 

And her opinion was shared by tens of thousands of dissatisfied Armenians who took to the streets of Yerevan. And as Garegin and Sose said, at the end their voice was heard, and they expect that the ruling elite will end up in political oblivion. 

That was the view of the opposition activists, but since every story has two sides, and this one with the latest protests in Armenia is no exemption, I came to the Armenian parliament to hear the other side. 

To learn about the position of the current ruling party, I’ve met long-time Republican Party MP Khosrov Harutyunyan. We spoke in his office, under the portrait of deposed leader Serzh Sargsyan. Harutyunyan sees this transition not as a defeat of his party but as a huge victory for democracy in Armenia and he sees no similarities with the events in Ukraine from a few years ago. 

“There is absolutely no comparison.” Harutyunyan said. 

“Even the Russians don’t see any similarities. This is an Armenian internal process which was not generated by any foreign influential players. Absolutely not, by anybody. It is exclusively an Armenian internal process. That’s why this process is going in a very peaceful manner, because everybody, authorities, opposition and civic society understand what price we would have to pay if this wasn’t peaceful.” 

He added that if the opposition wants to have their leader as the new prime minister, they have to come up with the program and solutions, what according to him, opposition lacks at this moment. But the most important thing, as Harutyunyan claims, is that all these changes are happening in a peaceful and democratic manner, something that people of Armenia apparently desperately need.