Could a New President in Turkmenistan Provide an Opportunity for the US to Promote Reform? – The Diplomat

After 15 years in energy, wielding authoritarian insurance policies which have saved Turkmenistan remoted and on the backside of human rights rankings, Turkmenistan’s President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov has determined to step down and switch his duties to his son Serdar. A snap presidential election will probably be held on March 12 and Serdar has already been nominated because the ruling get together’s candidate. 

The timing comes as a shock. Berdimuhamedov has spent the final a number of years grooming Serdar for a dynastic succession, selling him up by way of authorities ranks to more and more high-level positions, together with deputy prime minister and chairman of the Supreme Management Chamber, which controls authorities spending. However he had two years left in his present time period and will have run for reelection. Furthermore, Berdimuhamedov has spent years constructing his personal cult of persona much like that of his predecessor and Turkmenistan’s solely different president since independence, Saparmurat Niyazov.

Choice-making processes in Turkmenistan are notoriously opaque and it’s unclear why Berdimuhamedov determined to maneuver forward now along with his succession plan. Attainable causes embrace his well being, as he has suffered from diabetes for years, or being rattled by the current unrest in Kazakhstan, which started with well-liked protests over rising financial and social disparities. Though protests are uncommon in Turkmenistan, the nation has been gripped by a extreme financial disaster for a number of years, and there are indicators that well-liked dissatisfaction is rising. 

Serdar’s victory within the election is past doubt. Turkmenistan doesn’t have a genuinely multiparty system and has by no means held an election that met worldwide requirements. Since independence, each presidents have received with over 95 % votes, and the Group for Safety and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) has assessed that the nation lacks the stipulations for real democratic processes.

The actual query is to what extent Serdar’s coming to energy may open the door for any political, financial or social reforms, and whether or not the worldwide neighborhood, together with the USA, may seize the second to strengthen engagement with Turkmenistan and promote reform and improvement. 

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Serdar is more likely to preserve his father’s insurance policies and unchallenged energy. He’s already recognized for the authoritarian method he exercised his authority in his a number of positions inside the Turkmen administration. Furthermore, Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov virtually definitely will hold maintain of the levers of energy, a lot as his counterpart Nursultan Nazarbayev in Kazakhstan did after resigning in 2019. There are already experiences that Berdimuhamedov will stay in his positions as speaker of the Senate and as chairman of the Safety Council. It will restrict Serdar’s room to provoke any sweeping modifications that run counter to his father’s views.

Nonetheless, regardless of their commonalities, there could also be sufficient distinction between father and son to open a sliver of alternative for change. Serdar not solely has extra and broader authorities expertise than his father did when he got here to energy, however he has additionally spent vital time outdoors of Turkmenistan, together with in Moscow, the place he attended the Russian International Ministry’s Diplomatic Academy and was connected to the Turkmen Embassy, and in Geneva, the place he attended the Geneva Middle for Safety Coverage. He’s additionally of a unique era, one used to the better openness of the digital age. When saying that he would step apart, Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov pressured that it was essential to flip over energy to “younger leaders … in accordance with the excessive necessities of modernity.” 

Serdar seemingly is not going to be able to problem the essential parameters of his predecessors’ overseas coverage, such because the nation’s official standing of neutrality or the position of China by way of its investments within the fuel sector. His time in Moscow could have resulted in stronger ties to the Russian authorities. However, his expertise overseas may make him extra open to overseas companions, together with within the West, and his want to deal with no less than among the critical financial and social points going through the nation may lead him to concentrate on growing overseas financial relations, particularly by growing cooperation with overseas international locations and buyers. 

The state of affairs within the nation is dire. Hydrocarbon accounts for nine-tenths of Turkmenistan’s export earnings, and the 2014 fall in world hydrocarbon costs significantly diminished the state funds. This resulted in weakening the social welfare system, in addition to the already frail schooling and well being techniques, and precipitated critical meals insecurity, resulting in rationing within the state shops on which a majority of the impoverished inhabitants relies upon. This dire financial state of affairs has additionally resulted in large unemployment, now estimated at 60 %, particularly amongst younger folks and in rural areas. The shortage of alternatives has led practically half of the inhabitants to to migrate, a quantity virtually unprecedented in a rustic throughout peacetime, leaving just some 2.8 million folks out of a beforehand estimated inhabitants of 6 million.

Larger openness may enable U.S. firms to have interaction in varied sectors and contribute to the diversification of Turkmenistan’s economic system, which is presently virtually completely pushed by the extractive sector. An elevated presence of U.S. and different Western firms may additionally convey extra social company engagement; vocational coaching could possibly be notably helpful given the poor schooling system. A fair modest opening may enable for some elevated funding in different sectors, for instance schooling, well being, and surroundings. 

However this elevated engagement should include better efforts to advertise democratic reform, nevertheless small to start with, and respect for human rights. This could possibly be completed bilaterally or although worldwide organizations such because the OSCE, which already has a small presence on the bottom. An excellent place to start out could be to have Serdar start to offer info on those that have disappeared within the nation’s jail system for greater than 20 years, beginning with two former overseas ministers: Boris Shikhmuradov and Batyr Berdiev. This is able to be one of the best ways that Serdar may sign his intention to the worldwide neighborhood that his authorities is able to strengthen relations with the West. 

The US and others should be cautious to not fall into the lure of getting investments and even well-meant engagement misused by the kleptocratic system of corruption created by the primary two presidents of Turkmenistan to the good thing about their households and different elites. Serdar himself has been a part of this technique, and along with his father behind him, seemingly will proceed it. As a substitute, the USA and different like-minded international locations ought to concentrate on investing in sectors that profit the overall inhabitants greater than the political regime and its elites.

In fact, with out vital reform of the authoritarian nature of the federal government, U.S. room for maneuver and the impression of worldwide engagement is more likely to stay modest. It could end up that Serdar is rather like his father, and nothing will change in Turkmenistan. However even when the probabilities of making a distinction are slim, they’re value taking. The folks of Turkmenistan deserve it.