It is now nearly two weeks since the Kyrgyzstan government of Kermanbek Bakiyev was ousted, a victim of growing uprisings that he tried, and failed, to put down with police violence. Late last week, after unsuccessfully trying to convince the UN to invade and reinstall him, Bakiyev fled to Kazakhstan and had reportedly resigned. Its power seemingly assured, the post-uprising government moved forward with promises of an eventual election.
But normalcy is no easy thing in Kyrgyzstan, and despite Bakiyev being long gone the protesters have remained on the streets of the capital of Bishkek, seizing property from the city’s ethnic minorities and generally spreading mayhem.
Perhaps an even bigger issue long term is that the rural southern portion of the nation, long loyal to Bakiyev, still hasn’t accepted the new government’s control. In Jalal Abat, the local governor Faizullah Rakhmanov held a rally of some 1,000 Bakiyev supporters, promising they would soon march north against the capital and restore Bakiyev to power.
Bakiyev, for his part, seems nowhere to be seen since having fled to Kazakhstan, but his role as the presumptive leader of a civil war still festering in the south seems very much beside the point for a nation where deep divisions and a history of dubious democratic rule have left many, many scars.
"Now, as for whether this kid of situation could arise in other countries in the post-Soviet area, or elsewhere in the world … Anything is possible. If people are unhappy with their leaders, if the authorities do not make the needed effort to support people and address their biggest problems, this kind of situation could repeat itself anywhere, in any country where the authorities are no longer in touch with the people … Listening to some of the statements that followed these events [in Kyrgyzstan] it seems to me that these statements were dictated by fears that this conflict and its outcome stirred among the leaders in a number of countries. But the only way to avoid such fears is to govern one's own country in competent fashion…."
Medvedev quoted in Asia Times, April 20.
Or, in other words, S-A-A-K-A-S-H-V-I-L-I.
crr:Sakaashvili
Apparently, Bakiev is now in Belarus. A few hours ago he gave a speech in Minsk where he stated that he was still the President of Kyrgyzstan, despite having signed a letter of resignation last week:
http://www.rferl.org/content/Deposed_Kyrgyz_Leade…