MAMMOTH PHOTOS Emomali Rahmon, Tajik president with bushy eyebrows, is everywhere in Dushanbe, the capital: tread a suit, pose in a field of poppies, greet majestically. But as voters went to the polls to elect a new parliament on March 1, publicity for political parties was virtually invisible. The subliminal message was clear: whatever the voters’ vote, the president – officially, the founder of peace and national unity, the head of the nation – will always direct the series.
The People’s Democratic Party of Tajikistan, Mr. Rahmon, won 75% of the seats in Parliament. Five other parties won seats, offering different manifests but uniform devotion to the big man. Their role is to provide a semblance of opposition. The only outfit that criticized Mr. Rahmon, the Social Democratic Party of Tajikistan (SDPT), obtained 0.3% of the vote and no seats.
Rahmatullo Zoirov, the talkative lawyer who heads the SDPT, says the president is an illegitimate leader who has rigged the political system to cling to power, most recently in a referendum to keep him president for life. Zoirov had no illusions about the chances of his party, expressing doubts about “the fairness, freedom and transparency of this election” during his election. He refused to accept the results after their release. The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, which generally monitors elections in the region, has judged that the region is too substandard to deserve a full mission, citing limited political choices and deteriorating respect. fundamental freedoms. In some polling stations, at least one member was allowed to vote for an entire family. The electoral commission, however, declared that the vote was clean and fair.
Mr. Rahmon and his lackeys are not without support. Many voters leaving the polling stations approved the ruling party for the sake of preserving stability, a powerful motivator in a country that waged a brutal civil war after independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. They obtained what they want: Mr. Rahmon came to power in 1992, and is now the longest serving leader of the former Soviet Union.
Many others died. “To be honest, I am more interested in Brexit than local politics,” said one man, complaining that no one asked for his vote during the campaign, which did not include televised debates or rallies. One woman asked what she hoped for from the new parliament when she left a polling station, raised her eyebrows and replied, “Nothing.”
Tajikistan, the poorest country in the former Soviet Union, faces many problems: low wages, high prices and a shortage of work for the young and rapidly growing population of 9.5 million. Tajiks flock abroad to work, mainly in Russia: officially, the number of emigrants is 500,000, but by some estimates it could reach 2 million. Critics of Mr. Rahmon say his friends and relatives are fine, but not ordinary people. More than a quarter live in poverty, according to the government’s own figures. Tajikistan is deeply plagued by China, to which it has granted land and mining concessions to repay loans. It also depends on its former colonial master, Russia, who has a military base in Tajikistan.
The election was the first since a moderate Islamic party that had been the main opposition to Mr. Rahmon for years was banned in 2015. The government called the Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan a terrorist group, sending its chief, the soft-mannered Muhiddin Kabiri, fleeing abroad. Other senior members have been imprisoned. After his exile in Berlin, Kabiri rejected the discourse on terrorism as an “invented pretext” to ban the only party capable of presenting a challenge to Mr. Rahmon, who had already eliminated the most secular opposition. A reform movement called Group 24 was banned in 2014. Its leader, Umarali Quvvatov, was then shot dead in Istanbul.
Rahmon will likely stand for re-election in November. But there is speculation that he could retire and anoint his successor his son, Rustam Emomali, the mayor of Dushanbe, 32 years old. This would make the founder of peace and national unity the founder of the first modern dynasty in Central Asia. ■
This article appeared in the Asia section of the print edition under the title “United in unity”
