Central Asia’s young filmmakers and their work are extremely diverse. The audience at the 24th goEast film festival in Wiesbaden was able to see this for themselves in various short film programmes. Novastan reviews.

The 24th goEast Festival of Central and Eastern European Film took place in Wiesbaden from 24 to 30 April. In addition to two films in the main competition, Central Asian cinema was mainly represented with short films, which were shown in four different programmes. Three of them competed in the Rheinmain Short Film Competition. In addition, goEast showed “New Voices from Central Asia” in cooperation with the ZDF/ARTE short film magazine, a programme dedicated solely to the region. We present our highlights.

Black Wagon

Mining is one of the most important economic sectors in Kyrgyzstan. However, Adilet Karzhoev’s documentary film “Black Wagon” impressively shows the catastrophic conditions under which coal and other raw materials are mined. He takes viewers inside a private mine in southwestern Kyrgyzstan and illustrates the cramped conditions underground.

Darkness and dust dominate the aesthetics, while the workers make their way through the labyrinth of corridors with their bare bodies glistening with sweat. Background noise is loud and threatening. Within this surreal setting, Karzhoev nevertheless manages to capture the normality of everyday life that the workers create for themselves 500 metres underground: The tea brought down the shaft in a coal lorry and fresh air in bags. During the breaks, the miners eat and laugh about the unsolvable conflicts surrounding the Kumtor mine, the largest gold mine in the country, and the never-ending border conflicts.

The group sits together around a smartphone and watches a video. But danger literally hovers over the everyday scene: collapses and accidents can happen here at any time, parts of the shafts are only supported by wooden beams instead of safer metal struts. When a wall partially shatteres, the cameraman has just enough time to get his equipment to safety. According to the end of the film, one to two workers a month lose their lives in one of more than 300 private mines around the town of Sülüktü in south-west Kyrgyzstan.

Only at the end of the film are the viewers led out of the shaft into the daylight together with the workers. The miners are paid in cash and sent away – until their next assignment. Many of the workers work in mines for years, sometimes their entire lives – including those who have their say in Karzhoev’s film. At the end, when the camera once again shows the vast mountain landscape around the mine, it becomes clear why: mining remains the great economic hope for the region. However, Karzhoev’s short film puts an important spotlight on the inhumane working conditions – and it is to be hoped that these will receive even more attention in the future.

The late wind

Saya is pregnant. But shortly after her boyfriend Kairat finds out, he disappears without a trace. The film accompanies Saya on her search, which is repeatedly interrupted by street protests. Is Kairat running from responsibility? Or is his disappearance linked to the protests?

Although the film gets by with little plot and a minimum of dialogue, director Shugyla Serzhan creates an atmospheric film that stands as a symbol for today’s Kazakhstan. This is thanks in part to lead actress Tolganay Talgat, whose sensitive performance allows us to share Saya’s innermost feelings and contributes greatly to the unsettling atmosphere that hovers over the entire film. While Saya constantly longs for warmth and security and paints childlike pictures of the sun on the steamed-up window, she is constantly denied this closure. Shooting in Almaty’s wintry, grimy weather creates an omnipresent grey that emphasises the film’s oppressive mood.

Even if the street protests seem rather pathetic in view of the low film budget, they inevitably bring back memories of the Qantar, one of the most traumatic events in Kazakhstan’s recent past. Saya’s search remains unsuccessful, her questions unanswered. Together with her, the whole country looks into an unclear, but definitely unsettling future.

Old Things

Three men bathe in a canal, a girl talks lovingly to stuffed animals at a flea market, a worker proudly shows off his library card. “Old things” by Roman Zakharov is a portrait of the Uzbek capital of Tashkent that shows the contradictions of the post-Soviet city without falling into bold depictions.

Instead, Zakharov explores the multi-layered spectrum that the city offers, and in particular the people who live and work in it. There is a bread seller selling his wares by the roadside, a dog owner complaining about all the trash in the city, a passer-by talking about the political changes in the country. Zakharov subtly juxtaposes different realities: new buildings and parks, dirt on the roadside and neatly polished memorials, critical voices and oversized national flags. Different linguistic worlds also come together: sometimes Russian is spoken, sometimes Uzbek, and sometimes even the director, who comes from Kazakhstan, reaches the limits of his language skills in the conversations.

Read more on Novastan: “Alaqan”: Aida Adilbek’s decolonial documentary cinema

Zakharov’s short film seems to loosely follow the course of a day: from sunrise and a bazaar that seems to be just waking up, to the blazing midday sun on Tashkent’s Independence Square, to the Independence Monument in “Yangi O’zbekiston” Park in the form of a giant Huma bird glowing in bright colours in the evening. The juxtaposition creates the impression of a rounded portrait that impressively expresses the polyphony of the Central Asian metropolis and allows nuances to emerge that are otherwise often sought in vain in depictions of the Uzbek capital, and which allow for breaks with the usual national narratives.

Ask

Kyrgyz director Naizabek Sydykov’s dystopia takes us to a ruined city ruled by a bizarre dictatorship. According to the “great leader”, a “city of the future” is to be built here, but first the inhabitants are forced to demolish all the remaining houses. The compulsion to uniformity (“Be like the others”) and the surveillance are reminiscent of George Orwell’s works.

Read more on Novastan: “Ayban Ferma”: translatin George Orwell into Kyrgyz

Teenager Umut is one of the few who questions the circumstances. By chance, he discovers a capsule containing old plans of the city that is being destroyed. Umut realises: “There will be no city of the future, because we have already destroyed it.” When he dares to confront the “great leader” with questions at the next meeting, he is declared ill by his own parents, who fear that he will become a pariah, excluded from the glorious future. Umut also has to apologise publicly. Only his girlfriend (whose name is unknown), whom he has let in on his discovery, stands by him. Starting with her, more and more people begin to question the system.

Even if the actual reasons are probably to be found in the budget, Sydykov creates an incredibly cheap aesthetic in “Ask”, which seems to have been specially designed for the dictatorship portrayed and perfectly emphasises its absurdity. And although the film’s political message seems rather simple, “Ask” is a successful parable of contemporary regimes such as those in Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan or even in Kyrgyzstan under Sadyr Japarov, in which the political leadership always promises fundamental renewal without actually delivering it. It is time to question things.

Mirtemir is alright

Karakalpakstan in the summer of 2022: in the autonomous republic protests break out and are violently suppressed by the Uzbek government. The filmmakers Sasha Kulak and Mikhail Borodin travel to Nukus in the midst of this situation to get a first-hand impression. They meet Mirtemir at a mobile karaoke station on the city’s main square.

Mirtemir, who appears “like a teenager from Kreuzberg or Williamsburg” (goEast programme booklet), captivates the two filmmakers and the result is a wonderful portrait of a Karakalpak teenager who radiates incredible optimism. His life is not easy: he cares for his blind grandmother, with whom he lives, as his mother has gone abroad to work (a plan that Mirtemir also harbours himself). During the day he works in a fast food restaurant and at night at the karaoke station. But despite all his hardships, Mirtemir has a lightness of touch that comes from deep within.

With “Mirtemir is alright”, Kulak and Borodin provide an insight into a region that, apart from the Aral Sea and the Savitsky Museum, hardly receives any attention in the West. Through their camera work, which is sometimes frontal and usually very close to the protagonist, they create a film that – despite being a documentary – becomes almost fictional at times. And Mirtemir’s boundless confidence also raises the question of whether this light-heartedness is not an act in view of the camera. A film too good to be true?

No. Because the film does not turn a blind eye to the problems, but contrasts them with Mirtemir’s optimism with a laugh. The narrative has a serious background: Mirtemir shares the fate of many other children left behind by migrant workers from Central Asia, although viewers only learn this in the fade-out. But despite all this, Mirtemir’s positivity is infectious and, together with him, we can look forward to a bright future.

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With his new film “Goliath,” director Adilkhan Yerzhanov once again takes his audience into the vastness of the Kazakh steppe. The revenge western celebrated its German premiere on 29 April at the 23rd goEast Central and Eastern European Film Festival in Germany.

The film begins with a tribunal. Gangster Poshayev (played by Daniyar Alshinov) and his gang have just robbed the local police station. Now the three policemen and a villager named Karina are standing against the wall. Karina is offered one last cigarette; one of the gangsters reads out the statement she has just made against Poshayev. Poshayev pulls the trigger.

In the next scene, Karina is carried to her grave. Poshayev crouches down next to her widower Arzu (played by Berik Aytzhanov), who is sitting on the ground next to the burial mound. Poshayev explains that he couldn’t do otherwise. He wants to know if Arzu has a problem with him because of this. Arzu replies in the negative, followed by Poshayev giving him money and offering work. It is this combination of carrot and stick that establishes Poshayev’s rule over Karatas.

Kazakh western

Karatas, a fictional village in the Kazakh steppe, has also been the setting for Adilkhan Yerzhanov’s previous films. As in “A Dark, Dark Man”, Yerzhanov tells a story of injustice and powerlessness, with rough and sometimes desolate steppe providing a fitting background.

It was probably also the vastness of the breathtaking landscape that inspired the director to shoot a western. Because that is exactly what “Goliath,” with its hero taking on a gang of criminals on his own, is all about. Scenes in the mine that dominates the village and shootouts on a railway line in the steppe are further reminiscences of the genre.

The limping and stuttering Arzu is an unlikely hero. As villagers suspect he wants to take revenge on Poshayev for the death of his wife, they beat him up and chase him out of Karatas along with his young daughter, whom he looks after on his own after the death of his wife. It is thanks to Poshayev that almost all the villagers have jobs in the local mine – the very rumour that people might be against him is therefore dangerous. But when Arzu’s brother is also murdered by Poshayev’s men, Arzu takes on the quest for revenge.

The power of the strongest

With its magnificent landscape shots, a story of powerlessness in the face of crime tied to state power, and not least because of the Old Testament reference in the title, “Goliath” (a name that is not even mentioned in the film) has some parallels to Andrey Zvyagintsev‘s masterpiece “Leviathan”. So old wine in new bottles?

Not at all. Because with “Goliath”, Yerzhanov delivers a successful parable of power. While Danila Bagrov, the main character in Aleksei Balabanov’s epic gangster film “Brat” (Brother), justifies his actions by saying that “power lies in the truth”, Poshayev’s views are free of such morality and much less philosophical. Aware of his own crudeness, he explains to Arzu, pointing to his Kalashnikov: “This is power.”

However, Yerzhanov is not satisfied with such a flat answer. Almost as if to emphasise the importance of the question of power, he inserts appropriate quotes from Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli’s “The Prince” at various points in the film. The fact that Poshayev is also a “Machiavellian”, without presumably ever having read the Italian philosopher, is shown by another quote from “The Prince”. In the key scene of the film, in which Poshayev explains the principle of power to Arzu, he says that one has to be a lion and a fox at the same time: Because the lion cannot smell snares, and the fox gets no respect.

In the end, it is Poshayev himself who does not pay enough attention. He only realises the double game of the ostracised fox Arzu when it is too late. “Those that have been best able to imitate the fox have succeeded best,” Machiavelli concludes his comparison.

A film worth seeing

With “Goliath,” Adilkhan Yerzhanov has once again produced the best art-house cinema, which is well received by European audiences but hardly attracts any attention in Kazakhstan itself. Filmmaker Aida Adilbek reported during a symposium at the goEast film festival that “Goliath” was only screened in Almaty – and only for five days.

Read more on Novastan: “Alaqan”: Aida Adilbek’s decolonial documentary cinema

Nevertheless, the director has remained true to himself for years and delivers what his fans expect most. Yerzhanov knows how to stage a sad, socially critical story embedded in a breathtaking landscape of the steppe, using great camera angles and ingenious play of light and darkness. The film also impresses with its details and allusions, which are unfortunately not always immediately obvious. Even if “Goliath” is not the best story ever told by Yerzhanov, it is certainly a film worth seeing.

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Many Central Asian migrants have joined the Russian army since partial mobilisation was announced in Russia.  They are being pulled into Russia’s war in Ukraine against the advice of their countries’ consular organs.This article was oroginally published on Novastan’s French website on 19 October 2022.

On 21 September, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the mobilisation of 300 000 reservists, called up from a pool of 25 million potential fighters.  Some of these are seasonal workers and precariously employed migrants from Central Asia. Russia amended their federal law “On Conscription and Military Service” in 2013 so that every young person with Russian citizenship is required to perform mandatory military service, even when they have already served it in their land of origin.  According to reports by the Kyrgyz news portal Kaktus, recruitment of Central Asian migrants has taken place in the Sakharovo migration center in Moscow since 21 September. This marks a turning point in the war, as the government is no longer hiding their desire to recruit foreigners to expand the ranks of their army. There are no official figures for how many Central Asian citizens have been recruited to fight in Ukraine.  According to Radio Azattyq, the Kazakh branch of Radio Free Europe, the overwhelming majority of Central Asian migrants come from three countries: Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan.

High salaries and Russian passports as bait

Russian recruitment authorities want to mobilise migrants from Central Asia and do so by promising high salaries and Russian citizenship.  In some cases, the authorities use subterfuge.  “They told us that there was a lot of construction happening in Kherson and that we have to go there.  And that we could expect salaries of 220 000 rubles (£3065.94),” one witness told Eurasianet.  “Some from our group went but it turned out they had been taken along to fight.” The lure of profit and citizenship is an effective mode of manipulation. The use of migrants and refugees in war is, according to an article in the American journal Foreign Affairs, a widespread phenomenon. Their lives are used like chess pieces in the game of war. The Russian human rights activist Valentina Chupik spoke with Central Asian media agency CABAR about her experiences with Tajik migrants in an interview. According to Chupik, many have said that they have received anonymous calls from law enforcement officials with offers to join the Russian army and receive Russian citizenship within three months. Furthermore, one of the Tajik migrants questioned said that some of his friends and relatives had decided to serve in the army in order to earn more money to send home to their families. Even before partial mobilisation was announced, people with a Central Asian background or nationality were recruited. In fact, an investigation by MediaHub discovered that in Uzbekistan, certain online platforms advertising security-related jobs in Russia actually sent workers directly to a military base controlled by the private Wagner Group.  This Russian mercenary group is used in wars worldwide, including in Ukraine.  Ukrainian intelligence agencies say that “Central Asian recruitment campaigns for mercenaries” have been in operation since the beginning of the war.

The embassies react

The embassies from Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and Kyrgyzstan have called on their citizens not to involve themselves in the war in Ukraine. They claim that involvement is a criminal offense according to the domestic laws of their respective countries. The risk of being sucked into the war is particularly high for young men from Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan who have already acquired Russian citizenship. With a diaspora of 650 000 Kazakhstanis, 1.9 million Uzbekistanis, and 104 000 Kyrgyzstanis (numbers from 2002), able-bodied men from these groups could be subjected to forced recruitment. For Turkmen, Tajik, and Uzbek citizens, participation in a foreign conflict can lead to imprisonment upon returning home.  Particularly affected by this are the 1.2 million Tajik migrant workers (number from 2021) in Russia.  

Originally written in French by Matthieu Petrov 

Translated into German from French by Robin Roth 

Translated from German into English by Mari Paine 

Edited by Maya Ivanova

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Hundreds of dead seals were discovered in Turkmenistan, with the cause of their death unclear.  Government officials seem to want to conceal the mass deaths of the Caspian seal, which is listed as an endangered species.This article was originally published on Novastan’s German website on 17 March 2021. The Caspian Sea has been the site of an ecological tragedy, the cause of which is not yet known. Radio Azatlyk, the Turkmen service of Radio Free Europe, reported that on 4 February, hundreds of seal corpses and thousands of dead fish were found along the Turkmen coast. The Caspian seal is classified as an endangered species by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN). According to an eyewitness account last December, the corpses washed ashore on a stretch of coast near the harbour city of Türkmenbaşy. “Members of the naval forces recovered many dead seals in January. There were hundreds. In addition, there are many dead fish and birds on the coast […] our superiors require us to stay silent. Scientists from Ashgabat are trying to find out the seals’ cause of death, whether it might be a virus or waste dumped by local factories,” a Turkmen border guard interviewed by Radio Azatlyk explained.

The journalists of Radio Azatlyk were not able to obtain a comment from the Turkmen Ministry of Agriculture and Environmental Protection. However, there are indications that the cause of death was natural. At about the same time, numerous dead seals were discovered on the opposite coast of the Caspian Sea.

Parallels with Dagestan

The Moscow Times reported on 12 December 2020 that hundreds of seal carcasses were washed onto land in the Russian Republic of Dagestan in the days preceding the announcement. The Russian authorities started investigations, but had not been able to determine the cause until now. Initial investigations indicated that the seals may have died of natural causes. “The condition of the seals’ inner organs does not corroborate the hypothesis of poisoning by heavy metals or pesticides,” said biologist Vyacheslav Bisikov, who was involved in the investigations, according to the Russian news agency Interfax. The scientists were also able to rule out the possibility that the seals were collateral damage of fishing activities. On 26 January, the Russian news agency TASS reported that one of the possible causes of death could be the release of natural gas, according to Scientists from the Institute of Ecology and Evolution of the Russian Academy of Sciences. “Similar changes in the tissues of internal organs were found in all the pathologically examined seals. […] These changes may develop as a result of hypoxia and they indicate death by asphyxiation,” TASS quotes from a statement by the scientists. The researchers name the release of gases from seismic tremors or mud volcanoes at the bottom of the Caspian Sea as the most likely cause. The researchers furthermore succeeded in establishing that the seals died one to six weeks before they were discovered, meaning that they had died in November. Considering the prevailing winds and the surface currents, it is assumed that the animals died out in open water. Furthermore, 40 seismic tremors were registered in November alone. “Under calm wind conditions, local methane emissions above the sea surface can form gaseous air bubbles, which are unsuitable for respiration. This could very likely have led to the mass deaths of the Caspian seals, which were migrating north along the coast of Dagestan to their breeding grounds at the time,” the scientists conclude.

An endangered species

The Caspian seal is the only mammal in the Caspian Sea. The IUCN granted it the status of an endangered species in 2008. Since 2020 the seal is registered in Russia’s Red Book. The number of seals, whose colonies are spread out over Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Russia, is contested. “The last aerial count – a type of population census – was conducted in 2005. About 10,000 animals were registered at the time,” the Kazakh biologist Assel Baimukanova explained in September 2018. According to Interfax, Vyacheslav Bisikov assumes that “the populations of Caspian seals […] encompass 270,000 to 300,000 individuals”. On the Russian channel TV Rain, zoologist Ilya Gomiranov estimates that the population has decreased from a million to between 40,000-60,000 seals. According to Assel Baimukanova, the reasons for the population reduction are varied, including the decrease of ice cover due to global warming, and the pollution of the Caspian Sea with toxins and illegal fishing. Mass deaths of seals occur time and again. In 2000, for instance, more than 10,000 Caspian Seals died of a viral infection. Read more on Novastan:Troubled waters: Turkmenistan’s environmental policy As Interfax reports, hundreds of dead seals washed ashore on the Dagestani coast in 2012 and 2016 after severe autumn storms. The precise cause of death could not be established, Russian fishing authorities said. Last October, mass animal deaths occurred not far from the Kamchatka peninsula in eastern Russia.  According to official reports, the causes were natural. The investigations in Dagestan suggest that the animals which washed ashore in Turkmenistan died of the same causes. Nevertheless, the Turkmen authorities would do well to investigate the cause of death of the endangered animals instead of covering it up.  

Written by Robin Roth

Translated from German by Nora Neinonen

Edited by Mari Paine

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Miraziz Bazarov was sentenced to three years’ limitation of freedom of movement for defamation. A critic of President Shavkat Mirziyoyev and a supporter of LGBTQI rights, the Uzbek blogger was attacked with a baseball bat by unknown assailants in March 2021 and seriously injured. This article was originally published on Novastan’s German website on 23 January 2022. The verdict was announced on the second day of the trial. A criminal court in Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan, found the famous blogger Miraziz Bazarov guilty on 21 January of “defamation on the internet for heinous and selfish motives.” As reported by the Uzbek media Gazeta.uz, Bazarov received the maximum sentence authorized for this type of offence – three years’ limitation of freedom of movement.

Bazarov will serve the remainder of his sentence, two years and four months, under house arrest. He has already been under house arrest since the end of April 2021, as reported by Radio Ozodlik, the Uzbek branch of the American media Radio Free Europe. Time already served will be deducted from his total sentence. As the blogger’s mother told Russian media Fergana News, the judgment involves a ban on using the Internet and working as a psychologist. He is also prohibited from going to public events, cafés and restaurants. He is not allowed to consume alcoholic beverages and must stay home from 8pm to 8am. Bazarov’s lawyer, Sergei Mayorov, called the judgment against his client unfair. “Formally, the court acted in accordance with our legislation, but of course it is a biased court and it is the fulfilment of the will of the state,” the lawyer told Radio Ozodlik. He will advise his client to appeal the decision.

A well-known critic

Miraziz Bazarov was best known for his Telegram channel and his TikTok account. He notably criticized Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev and called for a boycott of the presidential election last October. The blogger is also well known for his commitment to the rights of homosexuals. Bazarov considers these to be aspects of individual freedom, as discussed by Radio Free Europe, and insists that he is not an LGBTQI activist, but a defendant of the privacy of individuals. Same-sex relations between men are considered “sodomy” in Uzbekistan and are punishable by prison terms of up to three years, reports the British NGO Open Democracy. Read more on Novastan:LGBTQIA Muslims: “An online imam with background music is hardly the absolute truth” On the evening of 28 March 2001, Bazarov was seriously injured when unidentified assailants attacked him in the street with baseball bats. The blogger was hospitalized with an open leg fracture, head trauma and bruising. On the same day, Bazarov invited anime and K-pop fans to gather in central Tashkent. But the event had to be cancelled because a crowd of unidentified men staged an unauthorized protest there against LGBTQI activists. The link with the subsequent attack on Bazarov has not yet been formally established. The perpetrators have not been arrested to date. As Gazeta.uz reports, the Uzbek Interior Ministry then published a video in which the blogger was indirectly held responsible for the anti-LGBTQI protests. “Miraziz Bazarov repeatedly demonstrated his depraved behaviour, deliberate disregard for the rules of conduct of society and the dissemination of humiliating antics, contrary to national culture, on social networks” the video states.

From hospital to house arrest

Upon being released from the hospital on 29 April, after more than a month of hospitalization, Bazarov was placed directly under house arrest as a “preventative measure.”  He was only released shortly before the start of his trial after several extensions, reports Fergana News. According to Radio Ozodlik, the Tashkent police said they received a total of 28 requests from citizens from 1-20 April, as well as a collective request from the teaching staff at a school, demanding legal action against the blogger. Teachers took offence at a video by Bazarov from October 2020, in which he said the school was a place “where old slaves and failures teach children to be slaves and failures.” As Radio Ozodlik reported on 14 May 2021, accusations from three bloggers were added to these complaints. Bazarov had accused them of moral harassment before the attack, and is said to have “received hundreds of death threats from their subscribers because of slanderous information disseminated by bloggers close to the government.” However, the judicial authorities allegedly ignored the information Bazarov had provided about these threats.

A blow to press freedom

But the blogger’s conviction isn’t the only blow to press freedom in Uzbekistan. From the start of the trial on 20 January, the court made it clear that it did not want independent reporting taking place. As Fergana News reported, reporters were only able to attend the trial, which was declared an open session, if they could present a recent PCR test. The catch was that this rule only applied to journalists and was not announced in advance. In addition, Sergei Mayorov made it known that the judge had prohibited anyone from disseminating information about the progress of the trial. “Until the end of the trial, no comments by the participants may be published in the media or disseminated in any way. That is why we do not have the right to make trial proceedings public,” explained Bazarov’s lawyer. This information was confirmed by the court to Fergana News. Despite a relative liberalization of the press after Shavkat Mirziyoyev, who was seen as a reformer, came to power in December 2016, journalists remain under heavy political pressure in the country. In June 2021, media outlets Kun.uz and Azon.uz were penalized with heavy fines for running articles with religious content. In the Reporters Without Borders 2021 press freedom rankings, Uzbekistan ranks 157 out of 180 countries. With the conviction of Miraziz Bazarov, the situation will likely see little change in 2022.  

Written by Robin Roth

Translated from German by Matthew Deveraux

Edited by Mari Paine

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As part of a government reshuffle, Turkmenistan’s president Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow has named his son Serdar deputy prime minister. The appointment comes after several months of speculation about the political rise of Berdimuhamedow junior.

This article was originally published on Novastan’s German website on 14 February 2021.

Serdar Berdimuhamedow’s political rise continues. Turkmenistan’s president Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow made his only son deputy prime minister for digitisation and innovative technologies on 11 February, Turkmenistan’s state news agency TDH reports. The 39-year-old Serdar was previously minister of construction and industry.

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The post of deputy prime minister for digitisation and innovative technologies was created on the same day. As reported by Turkmenportal, the office includes the chair of the Supreme Control Chamber, which manages government spending, and membership in the State Security Council. The president of Turkmenistan signed the corresponding decree “to further improve the work of the cabinet and the State Security Council, as well as to strengthen control over state property“.

Cabinet reshuffle

The appointment of Serdar Berdimuhamedow goes hand in hand with a general government reshuffle. According to the Amsterdam-based news site Turkmen.news, another deputy prime minister and the minister of agriculture and the environment were replaced.

Myratgeldi Meredow, who was deputy prime minister in charge of fuel and energy, was dismissed for “serious deficiencies” in his work and replaced by the former rector of the International Oil and Gas University Şahym Abdrahmanow.

The agriculture minister Magtymguly Baýramdurdyýew was relieved of his post on the same grounds. His deputy Altanur Altyýew succeeds him. As for Serdar Berdymuhamedow, his previous deputy Baýmyrat Annamämmedow is taking over as minister of construction and industry.

A step fuelling speculations of further political rise

Serdar Berdimuhamedow’s appointment as deputy prime minister is likely to have been just another step up the career ladder. The president’s son took up his previous office as minister of construction and industry almost exactly a year ago. Before that, he had been governor of the Ahal Region, bordering Iran, for a good six months and, even earlier, deputy foreign minister and member of parliament.

Read more: Central Asia in 2020: the year in review

Such an appointment comes as little surprise, but it nevertheless reinforces the rumors that Serdar could succeed his father as president. As early as November 2020, a source from government circles told Turkmen.news that Berdimuhamedow Junior would be promoted either to a leadership role in the Supreme Control Chamber or to the Halk Maslahaty, the upper house of parliament. The source further claimed that a transfer to the Supreme Control Chamber was more likely, given that the constitutional reform which created the upper house was still very recent.

As Turkmen.news notes, observers still assume that the constitutional reform is part of a transfer of power. The constitution now states that, should the president die or become incapacitated, the chair of the Halk Maslahaty will succeed them. It is therefore not unlikely that Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow will either promote his son to the head of the Halk Maslahaty in the foreseeable future or even hand over the office of president to him during his lifetime.

Robin Roth
Editor of Novastan Deutsch

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