In comments on the post on Turkmenistan’s election I wrote the other day, there is some discussion of high turnout numbers and legitimacy.
The website of the government of Turkmenistan is full of all kinds of other bits of information legitimizing the newly-inaugurated Gurbanguly Berdymuhammedov. (I submit that his nickname be “Stomatologbashi” since he is surely the most powerful dentist in the world.) One of the things I found most interesting was the use in one story of international election observation missions to give added legitimacy to the vote. Since the site is painfully slow to load, here is the quotation from both the Russian and English versions of the page.
- Выборы Президента Туркменистана проходят на высоком уровне, в соответствии с нормами международного права, свидетельством чему служит участие в их проведении помимо национальных наблюдателей, представителей авторитетных международных организаций, – поделился своими впечатлениями Парахат Халлыев, студент естественно-географического факультета ТГУ. – Горд тем, что мне вместе со всеми туркменистанцами, достигшими избирательного ценза, выпала честь участвовать в выборах главы государства.
“The presidential elections are held on a high organisational level in compliance with the international law that is proved by the fact that the national observers as well as the representatives of the authoritative international organisations monitor the election process,” Parahat Halliev, a student of the Faculty of Natural Sciences and Geography of the Turkmen State University shares his impressions. “I am proud that the honour to elect the president of the Turkmen state fell on me like other citizens of Turkmenistan, who have reached the voting age.”
Funny thing is, there were no international organizations running official observation missions. And of the representatives of foreign governments and institutions who were around, some declared the election unfree and unfair. But that won’t stop the Turkmen media from giving the impression of two big international thumbs up for the conduct of the election.
The Russian version of the politics page is full of plenty more to legitimate Berdymuhammedov. First, here are the vote totals:
за Атаджикова Аманяза – 85 16 голосов, или 3,23 процента избирателей, против – 2554 078 или 96,69 процента, за Бердымухаммедова Гурбангулы – 2357120 голосов, или 89,23 процента, против – 282174 , или 10,68 процента, за Гараджаева Оразмырата – 40821 голосов, или 1,55 процента, против – 2598473 или 98,37 процента, за Гурбанова Мухамметназара – 62672 голосов или 2,37 процента, против – 2576622 или 97,54 процента, за Нурыева Ишангулы – 62830 голосов, или 2,38 процента, против – 2 576 464 или 97,54 процента, за Поманова Аширнияза – 34733 или 1,31 процента, против – 2604561 или 98,60 процента избирателей.
The most important number in there is the 89.23% of votes in favor of the new president and the 10.68% against him. His closest competitor was Amanyaz Atajikov with 3.23% of the vote.
The rest of the news on the page is about whom Berdymuhammedov met on inauguration day, the letters of congratulations from foreign governments, and the president’s phone call with Putin. Read into this stuff what you will, but there certainly is political meaning of some sort.
Berdymuhammedov met with the presidents of Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Tajikistan, and Georgia. He met the prime ministers of Russia, Turkey, and Azerbaijan. He got a special representative from Hu Jintao, the first vice-president of Iran, and various officials from Armenia, Belarus, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Uzbekistan(’s parliament), Kyrgyzstan, and Pakistan. Nobody from the West…
Michael Steen has more great photos from Turkmenistan.
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With regards to the name “Stomatologbashi”: he may not be. Bashar al-Assad, the President of Syria, is also a dentist. So I guess how you measure their relative power would determine which one is really the most powerful dentist in the world. Afterall, Turkmenistan doesn’t have anything analogous to the occupation of Lebanon, the Hizbollah-Israeli war, or the accusations of supporting the Iraqi insurgency to deal with.
And not to toot my own horn, but I still think for the West, and the U.S. in particular not to actively court favor with Berdimuhammedov (Birdie?) is idiotic. His ascension represents an enormous opportunity to reshape energy politics in Asia and Europe.
I knew that if I threw that out there, someone would correct me if there were other dentist heads of state. Still, he should go for it to see if Bashar al-Assad freaks out the way Turkey’s government did when Niyazov tried to use his first choice, “Ataturk.”
I think you’re right that not courting Turkmenistan is idiotic for the West. I do believe that there were officials that were sent, but they weren’t particularly prominent.
I wonder if the American Dental Association sent a representative.
It could be a real breakthrough for the floss industry in Central Asia.
“Nobody from the West…”
True, although Georgia and (less so now) Ukraine are supposed to be two of the former Soviet Union’s shining democratic lights, and they seemed happy enough to endorse Berdymuhammedov’s victory.
Looking back now that I’ve seen more of who was and was not there, I think that’s what is interesting is that the Turkmen government webpage didn’t say anything about the US and European officials who were on hand. The US Undersecretary for the region was there for the inauguration. Granted, he’s not cabinet level, but I’m surprised there was no mention of him.
And now there is an article about the president meeting Richard Boucher up at the government website.
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