by Edward_
Kyrgyzstan held very important parliamentary elections yesterday and the voting was peaceful. The story is changing by the hour, but the Central Asian nation is awaiting the results and holding its breath, as some are predicting more (and widespread) protests if the results seem less than fair. Early results suggest that up to two-thirds of the seats will be need to be decided in run-off elections. This probably doesn’t bode well for preventing more protests. We’ll see.
The big question in all this is whether the new parliament will be inclined to change the constitution so that current president Askar Akayev can run again (he denies he really wants this, but he’s not trustworthy). There have been protests already (as our very own Charles Bird pointed to yesterday, and, as Charles noted, Registan has been following very closely) as Kyrgyz citizens protested the government’s exclusion of some opposition candidates.
Unfortunately, the elections in bordering Tajikistan have already been declared a failure by the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE):
Peter Eicher, OSCE mission chief, who had 130 observers watching the poll in the former Soviet republic, said his monitors noted improbably high turnout figures and election fraud.
"I regret to say that the overall process was a disappointment," he told a news conference. "We witnessed direct falsification. The extent of these irregularities does raise doubts about the integrity of the tabulation process."
The OSCE gave the Kyrgyz elections slightly higher marks, but still cited problems:
"These elections were more competitive than previous ones, but sadly this was undermined by vote buying, de-registration of candidates, interference with media and a worryingly low confidence in judicial and electoral institutions on the part of voters and candidates," said Kimmo Kiljunen, Head of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly delegation and appointed by the OSCE Chairman in Office as the Special Co-ordinator of the short-term observers.
Longtime readers may recall that my partner is Kyrgyz. Having grown up in the Soviet Union (where elections were a joke), he doesn’t share my sense that vigilance can make a difference here. He expects Akayev to cheat (and change the constitution or insert a member of his family into the presidency when that election takes place in the fall), and he thinks the protests will not change much except to get a lot of people hurt. I don’t share his pessimism and really hope the general attitude about the importance of voting has changed in the years he hasn’t lived there. We’ll see.
My best wishes to your partner, Edward. I honestly can’t imagine what it would be like to be watching events like these in my homeland from such a distance.
Thanks Jes,
His family live in the capital, so I’d hate to see violence erupt there. They have enough to worry about as it is.
Still, I’m optimistic. I think the world can pressure Akayev into doing the right thing, setting the right example, and stepping down peacefully. Dr. Rice should be doing what she can to encourge that.
Thank you Edward and Jesurgislac.
We’ll see, wont we?
Who knows how things are going to actually turn out, but trends are moving in a favorable direction. I hope we keep the pressure on Akayev.
As far as I can tell, the elections were flawed, Akaev is running his children as candidates, and there are demonstrations, though not huge ones. I wish them well, and your partner, Edward.
Does anyone know why, exactly, Kyrgyzstan’s early appearance of being democratic faded so quickly? Was it only an appearance all along, or did Akaev just become corrupt, or what? (At least he’s not as bad as Niyazov…)
It looks very much like Akaev just became corrupt.
Again, though, from what I can tell, the democracy jumped out ahead of the people’s faith in it, meaning that they went through all the motions because, well, this was new and fun, but were not culturally confident it meant anything significant. They had known only corruption for their entire lives and were not at all surprised (or enraged enough to curb it) when they saw Akaev begin to show signs of wanting the position for life.