#173: Democracy Devalued

Armenian elections results showed that leaders of ex-Soviet republics have complete disregard for democracy as a process. Democracy has become such a hackneyed word that it has lost meaning to most people, especially to the leaders, in Central Asia. In fact, the word democracy has come to mean instability, corruption, moral degradation, and all the negative consequences of "transition."

Look at the last elections in Central Asia. In Kazakhstan, president's Nur-Otan party won all the seats in the parliament. Nazarbaev also changed the constitution to stay as long as he wishes. In Uzbekistan, Karimov won in an election where two of his opponents actually said that Karimov should remain the president and voted for him. Of course, the fact that the Uzbek constitution had a limit of only 2 terms for one person did not matter. In Kyrgyzstan, president's Ak-Jol party won most of the seats in the parliament, but nobody, even the Central Election Commission, can explain how it happened. Two months passed since the December 16 election, but the results have still not been published. In Tajikistan, the situation is similar. Turkmenistan is a separate case. And, all the presidents claimed elections were democratic.