Turkmenistan: Little Competition Expected for Presidential Elections

Peretz Partensky

One of numerous portraits of President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov in Ashgabat, 2009

The presidential elections in Turkmenistan have been announced for February 12, 2012, Turkmenistan Golden Age, the official government webside reported August 4.

The brief announcement contained no indication of whether opposition parties or candidates would be permitted. At the height of the crisis following the explosion in Abadan, President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov curiously appeared to invite opposition leaders to participate in the next elections.

The invitation was made in a televised summary of a presidential speech, yet the full text of the speech published later on the government website and state newspapers contained no reference to the opposition. The implication was that opposition leaders in exile could return to their homeland.

Opposition members abroad greeted the announcement with skepticism regnum.ru reported, citing the emigre publication Oazis. A law on presidential elections passed on June 1 is stricter than past laws and stipulates that candidates must be must be between 40 and 70 years of age, have resided in Turkmenistan for the last 15 years, have no prior convictions, and collect at least 50,000 signatures.

The Mejlis (parliament) has not yet passed a law on parties -- so technically, even Turkmenistan's sole, ill-named Democratic Party doesn't have a legal basis. Last year, after meeting with French President Nicholas Sarkozy, Berdymukhamedov announced apparent concessions after quiet diplomatic pressure to permit more democracy. The Turkmen leader said he wouldn't object if a second party were formed, and suggested an agrarian party.

Months later, when the second party failed to appear, he made it seem as if the problem was lack of initiative or insufficient speed by the rubber-stamp parliament, although no party could come into existence without his say-so. It's not clear why the alternative vehicle didn’t emerge; perhaps the dictator couldn't find the appropriatelly pliable and loyal yet compelling figure.

Now, there’s only about six months for the Mejlis to pass the enabling legislation, and for the second or any other parties to emerge -- and gather 50,000 signatures in a country where independent political activism is severely punished. Of course, legislation can be whipped into shape on demand, as we saw with the pressure on Turkmenistan before it had to appear at the UN Commitee Against Torture. Right now, the European Union has a certain amount of leverage over Ashgabat as it is poised to vote on a Partnership Cooperation Agreement, which individual countries like France will also have to ratify.

In the 2007 elections, alternative candidates were permitted, and their campaigns provided a modest opportunity for the public to articulate carefully-expressed concerns about the need for educational and agricultural reforms. Yet since then, the “Protector,” as Berdymukhamedov is now called by his acolytes, in his self-proclaimed “Era of New Revival” has already embarked on all the necessary reforms. It may not be in his interests to reveal any gaps. Parliamentary elections came and went last year without the promised second party.

Some opposition figures have decided to take the president up on his offer: Nurmukhammet Hanamov, the Vienna-based chairman of the Republican Party of Turkmenistan, and Khudaiberdy Orazov, deputy prime minister under past dictator Saparmurat Niyazov, who left Turkmenistan and heads up the Vatan opposition group abroad, News Briefing Central Asia (NBCA) reported.

Given that the Turkmen government tried furiously to keep Hanamov and other exiles from speaking at the Organization for Security and Cooperation's Review meetings in Warsaw and Vienna and blocked their visas to Kazakhstan to attend the Astana summit, the prospects don't immediately look good for safe entry to Turkmenistan.

In an interview with NBCA, Orazov cautioned that he would take the offer seriously only if it were backed by actual deeds -- including passage of the relevant laws, publicizing the reasons why the opposition under Niyazov wound up abroad and guarantee of a safe passage. He and Hanamov were tried in absentia for their alleged involvement in a 2002 coup plot against Niyazov, and Turkmenistan has tried to characterize them "terrorists," but they have been granted political asylum abroad.