Turkmenistan holds election for new President

Ashgabat, Feb 11: Turkmenistan was choosing a new president in its first contested election today but the outcome was beyond doubt and diplomats say they expect at best only gradual change in the Central Asian state.

Six candidates are officially vying to replace the late President Saparmurat Niyazov, who ruled the gas-rich state for two decades with an iron fist while building golden statues of himself and stamping his image on every part of daily life.

Human rights groups have condemned the poll to replace him after his death from a heart attack in December as a sham that would consolidate ''a new dictatorship'' in the desert nation.

Acting leader Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov, who survived 10 years of frequent culls in Niyazov's cabinet, is the likely victor. An inauguration has been planned for Wednesday, even though technically there could be a second round.

Berdymukhamedov has sprung from relative obscurity to become the successor-in-waiting thanks to the backing of powerful figures in the armed forces and the large ranks of the internal security services, diplomats and the opposition say.

The United States, Europe and China are watching closely, keen to see Turkmenistan's gas flow along new routes beside the Soviet-era pipeline that allows Russia to benefit from below market prices.

Turkmenbashi

At a polling station in the capital Ashgabat today, a military band accompanied a singer performing a piece in honour of Turkmenbashi (Leader of the Turkmen), one of Niyazov's official titles.

''Which one promised to pay a pension? That's the one I want to vote for,'' said an ethnic Russian woman in her 50s, who declined to give her name.

Most of the early voters were soldiers but there was also a trickle of civilians. Voting began at 8 am 8.30 ist and runs until 6 pm 18.30 ist.

''We're not voting on the programmes because they are all the same,'' said a Turkmen man in his 40s, voting with his wife.

''We're voting for the one we find sympathetic.'' Many of Niyazov's former ministers ended up in prison or exile, where some of them have formed opposition movements banned from participating in today's vote. Human rights groups say the country has a large number of political prisoners.

In his campaign, Berdymukhamedov praised Niyazov but pledged to reverse some of the more unpopular policies of the ''Great Leader'', despite his own role in implementing them.

The 49-year-old trained dentist has said he will give Turkmens access to the Internet, extend school and university provision and improve health services.

Niyazov kept the country closed off from the outside world, cut the number of years children went to school to nine, fired thousands of nurses and other medical staff and closed provincial hospitals.

Foreign diplomats have reacted with cautious optimism to the hints of liberalisation and outsiders have started trying to court the new country's new rulers.

''I guess they are now in the mood to intensify international cooperation,'' Swedish parliamentarian Goran Lennmarker said during a visit yesterday as president of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe's (OSCE) Parliamentary Assembly. The OSCE is a 56-nation rights and security group.

Reuters