Turkmenistan’s horse-loving dictator is grooming his son

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Though the government’s propagandists try their best to present the country as a land of plenty, Turkmenistanis are all too aware of the real state of the economy

That, at any rate, is the official picture. The reality is quite different. Wage arrears are rife. The black-market value of the manat, the country’s currency, is a seventh of the official rate. Even the usually upbeat president has fretted about Turkmenistan’s swelling debt, though its precise scale is kept secret. The Asian Development Bank reckonsgrew a modest 1.6% in 2020 as energy prices slumped and Chinese demand for natural gas fell.

Exports have bounced back with the recent surge in demand for natural gas, but an inflexible contract with China has prevented Turkmenistan from reaping the full rewards of skyrocketing prices. The Taliban’s takeover of neighbouring Afghanistan has made even more unlikely already stalled plans to build a pipeline to carry gas to new markets in South Asia. The militants say they want the pipeline to go ahead, but few foreign backers are keen.

. State television shows shops with overflowing shelves, but “in reality people go at 4-5am to queue at state food shops,” says Farid Tukhbatullin, who heads the Turkmen Initiative for Human Rights , an advocacy group based in Vienna. Most citizens dare not complain “because they fear the person next to them could be an informer”, he says.

People who do question the official line are harassed by security men. Soltan Achilova, a 72-year-old journalist in Ashgabat, the capital, who earlier this year publicly criticised the government for shortages of flour and cooking oil, which are subsidised, has faced threats, attacks and arrest as a result of her reports to Chronicles of Turkmenistan,Last year a young man named Nurgeldi Halykov was jailed after sharing with Turkmen.

Earlier this year Mr Berdymukhamedov appointed his 40-year-old son, Serdar, as deputy prime minister answerable only to the president. Two months later the younger Berdymukhamedov was made head of the country’s horse association. The local Akhal-Teke horses and Alabai dogs play an important role in the president’s personality cult. Photographs aired this summer showing Serdar astride a thoroughbred, a gift from his father, again fuelled speculation among Turkmenistanis about a coming succession.

 

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But is the horse-loving dictators son ready?

Ngọc Mai Bảo Quyên Đông Nghi Hồng Duy Hoàng Thảo Chi

Nepotism’s been the paean of dictators throughout history. We’ve come to expect that. What’s not expected is where it arises in supposed liberal democracies; case in point Trump trying to position his brood. That’s frightening.

Inferior Potassium

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this is terrible news

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What an ass.

Elections are not suitable for many countries including Turkmenistan. They need a Sultan.

With a brush?

thanks

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