Kazaxia

Lord Venal has received a missive from one of his sources in Tashkent revealing the outcome of a secret meeting in Uzbekistan’s capital between heir-apparent Shavkat Mirziyoyev and his long-time sidekick Rustam Azimov.

Shortly after the news broke on 28 August of President Islam Karimov’s hospitalisation, Shavkat apparently invited Rustam to Tashkent’s Polyanka restaurant for a discreet tête-à-tête.

Lord Venal’s source saw a happy looking Rustam leave the restaurant clutching a beermat, while a self-satisfied looking Shavkat dropped his to the floor as he left.

The source retrieved the beermat and found the following formula scribbled on it:

(SM x 2) = (RA=PM x 2) = SM

Our source was puzzled, but Lord Venal sniffed a pact along the lines of the infamous Granita Pact between Tony Blair and Gordon Brown in the UK in the 90S.

He has interpreted the coded message to mean that Mirziyoyev will be president for two terms with Azimov as his prime minister. The reins of power will then be handed over to  the PM.

As with all these deals, there’s a catch – Mirziyoyev is widely expected to introduce a 14-year presidential term, thus allowing him to be forever known as Uzbekistan’s longest serving president after serving his two terms allowed in the constitution, beating the late Karimov by a year, who will forever be known as Uzbekistan’s first president.

By that time Azimov will be in his mid-8os – a classic case of better late then never.

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You have your own accommodation, fully serviced with all appropriate staff, but can interact with your fellow-dictators in the lounges and communal areas of the facility. Swap wisdom and anecdotes of days gone by. Discuss how to tackle those pesky problems that afflict even the most accomplished of dictators. Surround yourself with a supportive network of like-minded friends.

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“This is just what the late Islam Abduganievich needed to have avoided the loneliness and indignity of his final years” – a fellow regional president.

News reaches kazaxia from Tashkent that Islom ‘Butch’ Karimov, who in a strange case of mistaken identity became president of Uzbekistan last year, has passed away, just a few days after his namesake Islam Karimov.

Found wandering the streets of Qarshi, Uzbekistan in February last year, Butch was whisked away to Tashkent to become president because of his remarkable likeness to missing president Islam Karimov.

‘Butch’ received his nickname for being a dead ringer of his near namesake, who was most famous for the role he played as the Butcher overseeing the bloody massacre in Andijan, Uzbekistan in 2005.

Unfortunately, Butch never got to realise his dream of emulating his hero, Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe, by staying in power for more than three decades but in a last request, he may live on as the ‘Eternal President’.

Earlier this week, Lord Venal received some intriguing documents detailing these last wishes. It is not clear whether the next president will act upon them.

Lord Venal was handed the documents in a Tashkent nightclub after a pleasant evening of dancing (not very expertly) and drinking (with more assurance). He was surprised at the good cheer all around, despite the drama being played out in a nearby hospital.

DECREE OF THE PRESIDENT OF UZBEKISTAN

On the title ‘Eternal President’

The First President of the Republic of Uzbekistan is to be awarded the title of ‘Eternal President’.

The title is to exist eternally and cannot be revoked or passed to another individual.

The holiday of the ‘Eternal President’ is to be marked on the anniversary of the birth of the ‘Eternal President’. Ceremonies are to be held at the monument in the capital Tashkent and all towns across Uzbekistan.

I. Karimov

President

29 August 2016

Tashkent

AMENDMENT TO THE CRIMINAL CODE OF THE REPUBLIC OF UZBEKISTAN

DRAFT

The Criminal Code is to be amended with the addition of the following article:

“The attempt to remove from the lawful incumbent the title of ‘Eternal President’ simply because the holder of the title is dead

– shall be punishable with a sentence of deprivation of liberty or imprisonment for eternity, with or without eternal confiscation of property.

I. Karimov

President

With confusion swirling around the fate of Uzbekistan’s long-serving president Islam Karimov, who suffered a brain haemorrhage on 27 August, succession scenarios have mushroomed across the media.

According to an Instagram post from Lola Karimova-Tillyaeva, the  ailing president’s youngest daughter, on 29 August, the strongman leader, who has been at the helm of Uzbekistan since before independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, was hospitalised following the cerebral haemorrhage and was in a ‘stable’ condition. Later reports, still unconfirmed, claimed the president had died on that day at 15.35 Tashkent time. The presidential administration subsequently denied this.

This has brought into sharp focus the question of who is next in line to the throne. The frontrunners are Prime Minister Shavkat Mirziyoyev, Finance Minister and first deputy to Mirziyoyev, Rustam Azimov and national security head Rustam Inoyatov, according to EurasiaNet.org and RFE/RL.

Mirziyoyev, 59, is considered to be a gruff hardliner, while Azimov, 57, is a relatively more urbane figure, used to dealing with the wider world. Inoyatov, 72, is more likely to be the kingmaker, unless he’s keen to play Andropov to Karimov’s Brezhnev and delay the long-term succession question.

The Karimov clan could provide a dark horse in the form of the president’s younger daughter, the aforementioned Lola Karimova-Tillyaeva, or her husband Timur Tillyaev, but after the spectacular reversal of fortunes of elder daughter Gulnara Karimova, the Karimov clan’s stock may not be very high these days.

Gulnara Karimova, the artist formerly known as GooGoosha, has been under house arrest in Tashkent since early 2014. The chances of her apeing Leicester City and coming good at 5,000-1 are extremely remote.

Tashkent is predictable in its unpredictability, so the close-knit cabal of Uzbekistan’s ruling elite may well have a surprise up its collective sleeve as to who will best protect their interests.

One thing is certain, the will of the people is unlikely to play any significant role in the choice of successor.

Kazaxia has received this guest contribution on the fallout from Central Asia’s Leader of the Nation spat:

An unseemly legal spat is unfolding at the International Court of Justice as Kazakhstan sues Tajikistan over the right to use the honorific ‘Leader of the Nation’ for the president. Kazakhstan’s sudden lodging of the suit came as Tajikistan’s long-ruling president Emomali Rahmon was poised to sign a law designating himself with the contentious term.

‘I was gob-smacked when I learnt of this ridiculous suit,’ a Tajik diplomat in the Hague told Venality News, declining to give his name as he was not authorised to speak to the press. ‘There’s only one president worthy of the title, and that’s our esteemed and irreplaceable Emomali Rahmon. Indeed, he is so irreplaceable that he will never be replaced.’

But Kazakh diplomats insist that the slight to their veteran president Nursultan Nazarbayev will not go unpunished. ‘We have to stop this in its tracks,’ one told Venality News, also speaking anonymously. ‘Right now.’ He pointed out that Rahmon is a newcomer, having been president only since 1994. ‘Our illustrious president has a far longer and more dignified pedigree.’

The Kazakh diplomat also pointed to Nazabayev’s modesty, granting himself only immunity from prosecution for actions conducted as president. ‘Rahmon thinks he deserves immunity for life – is he going to go on a crime spree when he becomes senile?’

Long-time observers of the arcane world of presidential honorifics are sceptical about the claims of both parties. ‘While it’s clear that Rahmon nicked the idea off Nazarbayev, he in turn seems to have nicked the idea off Niyazov or Aliyev,’ says Ebenezer Prince de la Palace, Executive Grandmaster of the Institute for Pretentious Presidential Perquisites in San Marino, referring to the late Turkmen and Azerbaijani leaders.

Kazakhstan’s suit to the Hague-based United Nations court is also likely to trigger an honorific arms race. Kazakh lawmakers are already mulling two new laws presented by eager ruling party deputies. One would give Nazarbayev immunity not only for the rest of this life but posthumously also. The other would grant him the honorific ‘Leader of the Universe’. The proposers of the second law are taking no chances. They have included a clause to say that the title will be held eternally.

Kazaxia’s political commentator Gary Kefali has been In Kazakhstan to check out the celebrations marking 550 years of Kazakh statehood.

As Kazakhstan celebrates the 550th anniversary of statehood, is it finally time for the nation to shrug off the ‘young country’ label it has held for many years?

Who would have thought back in 1465 when Kerey and Zhanibek Khan set up the forerunner of modern-day Kazakhstan that 550 years later the state would still be referring to itself as a ‘young country’.

The state uses this label to conceal a multitude of problems related to human rights, press freedom, democracy and freedom of belief and assembly. Whenever criticised, the familiar refrain of “Kazakhstan is a very young country” is invoked by the authorities.

Now it seems that it is not so fresh-faced after all with its long history being celebrated in Taraz. As kazaxia suggested in 2011, it’s time Kazakhstan grew up and accepted responsibility for its actions.