Parliamentary elections held in Uzbekistan on the 22nd of December, with a second-round scheduled for January 5, 2020. This is the first election since the death of its first president in office back in 2016, Islam Karimov.
How Uzbekistan Parliamentary Elections Work
The 150 members of the Legislative Chamber are elected from single-member constituencies using the two-round system where, if no candidate receives enough of the votes in the first round, then a second round of voting is held with either just the top two candidates or all candidates who received a certain proportion of the votes. In this case, a second-round is held in constituencies where voter turnout is less than 33%.
Preliminary Results
The Liberal Democratic Party of Uzbekistan led the vote, winning 43 seats, the National Revival Democratic Party followed with 35 seats, the Social Democratic Party received 21 seats, the People’s Democratic Party got 18 seats while the Ecological Party won 11 seats. With more than 20.5 million voters registered, the election had a 71% voter turnout.
How Did it Go?
The elections were deemed generally free and fair, with about 825 observers, as well as representatives of nine international organizations including the UN and 41 foreign countries. For the first time, the election campaign saw a freer media landscape with journalists and bloggers actively monitoring the process, but irregularities, such as voting on behalf of others and disregard for key procedures during counting were reported.
Free Elections, No Real Opposition
Despite new electoral reforms by president Shavkat Mirziyoyev, the new electoral law has not made the political system more competitive. The stringent requirement to gather 20,000 signatures in order to create a party still holds. This has been an obstacle to new parties who want to participate in the electoral process but are unable to garner enough signatures.
As such, no new party has been registered in the country since 2003, except the five already existing parties. Akhmed Rahmanov, an independent Uzbek analyst speaking to Aljazeera said: “People are aware of this reality and they realize that this election is not going to change much. There is no real opposition, no real competition and the parliament doesn’t have much power.”
Uzbekistan elections have been problematic since the breakup of the Soviet Union, with Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, and Turkmenistan deeply rooted in authoritarian systems. For Uzbekistan, this is the first vote since President Mirziyoyev replaced the late Islam Karimov three years ago. He introduced a reform agenda that included an Election Code which makes room for a transparent electoral process and the right to vote for any candidate without pressure from the state. Final results will be out by Monday.
