Kyrgyzstan elections

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FP Passport | FOREIGN POLICY

Nationalist party surges in Kyrgyz elections

Morning Brief: Nationalist party surges in Kyrgyz elections
Posted By David Kenner Tuesday, October 12, 2010 - 8:30 AM

Top story: As the votes were counted in Kyrgyzstan's Sunday presidential election, a nationalist party called Ata-Zhurt, meaning Homeland, registered a surprisingly strong showing. With more than 97 percent of the votes counted, the party gained 8.6 percent of the vote. Four other parties exceeded the five percent threshold to enter the 120-seat parliament, but none appear to have won a larger share of the vote.

Ata-Zhurt draws most of its support from the predominantly rural southern part of the country, which has recently been wracked by violence between ethnic Uzbeks and Kyrgyz. The party opposes the country's new Constitution, which shifted power to the parliament from the executive branch. It has also spoken out against Manas military base, the U.S. installation that has been a crucial conduit for transporting supplies into Afghanistan. Analysts fear that the nationalist party, in alliance with a pro-Russian party that also performed well in the Kyrgyz elections, could overturn the parliamentary order and pose new problems for Manas.

Still, many were heartened that the election took place in a peaceful and orderly manner. The country has suffered two coups in the past five years, and its neighbors in Central Asia are largely governed by authoritarian regimes. The parties that won seats in parliament must now begin negotiations over the formation of a coalition government.

 

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Kyrgyzstan's election: Making a Switzerland on the Fergana | The Economist

Making a Switzerland on the Fergana

Oct 12th 2010, 10:17 by B.B. | BISHKEK

SIX months after the bloody overthrow of its authoritarian president, Kurmanbek Bakiyev, Kyrgyzstan has accomplished what counts as a truly remarkable feat, by Central Asian standards. It held parliamentary elections on October 10th and it held them with flying colours: the voting was marked by political pluralism and a vibrant campaign that provided its citizens with a genuine choice. The Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), which monitored the election, had far more praise for the process than it did criticism. In the OSCE’s assessment the election brought Kyrgyzstan an important step closer to meeting its commitments to democracy.

Such was not to be taken for granted in a region that otherwise continues to be ruled by authoritarian leaders. In June, soon after Mr Bakiyev’s departure, a constitutional referendum set the stage for Kyrgyzstan’s evolution into a parliamentary republic. Neighbouring governments have regarded the process with disdain. They seem to be displeased at seeing anything like a role model for democracy sprouting in their own backyard. But for Kyrgyzstan the election extends a hope that it may yet again become known as the “Switzerland of Central Asia,” the moniker it took during the first years after it gained its independence from the Soviet Union, in the early 1990s.

According to preliminary results however—and to the dismay of many observers—it is the nationalist Ata-Zhurt party, which unites some of Mr Bakiyev’s former colleagues, that seems to have received the greatest number of votes. The party’s lead looks narrow, for the time being, consisting of 8.85% of the votes, against the 8.06% won by the Social Democratic Party of Kyrgyzstan, which claims credit for last April’s revolution. These two are the largest of the five parties (of an initial field of 29) that have passed the threshold to enter parliament; respectively, they have won 28 and 26 of the house’s 120 seats. Their close margins reflect the country’s deep divisions.

It remains to be seen how this new parliament will function and who will become the next prime minister. Days if not weeks of heated debate lie ahead. Most of the new parliamentarians are familiar faces on the political scene. Yet no one has any experience in coalition-building, which will be essential if Kyrgyzstan’s political reforms are to last. Establishing a consensus and making concessions are skills that these new-old parliamentarians will have to learn quickly.

And the government will need to be strong too, if it is to start an effective reconciliation process in the south of the country, where relations between ethnic Kyrgyz and ethnic Uzbeks remain tense. In June, an outburst of violence between the two communities caused the deaths of more than 400 Kyrgyzstanis and the forced migration of hundreds of thousands more. The new parliament and the next prime minister will be expected to address this issue in earnest, as the interim government was unable to do. More than anything else, it is peace and harmony that the people of Kyrgyzstan now crave.