Strictly controlled Uzbek elections did not offer a genuine choice, ODIHR observers conclude

TASHKENT, 24 December 2007 - Yesterday's presidential election in Uzbekistan was held in a strictly controlled political environment, leaving no room for real opposition, and the election generally failed to meet many OSCE commitments for democratic elections. The recommendations issued by the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR), after the 2004 parliamentary elections in Uzbekistan have not yet been implemented.

This is the conclusion of the OSCE/ODIHR Limited Election Observation Mission (LEOM), deployed on 5 December following an invitation by the Uzbek Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

"In the context of democratic development, it is notable that this time there were more candidates than in earlier presidential elections, including a female candidate and a non-partisan candidate nominated by an initiative group. But since all candidates in the present election publicly endorsed the incumbent, the electorate was deprived of a genuine choice," said Ambassador Walter Siegl, who led the election observation mission.

The election campaign was hardly visible and characterized by the absence of any real competition of ideas and political views. The campaign materials, produced by the Central Election Commission (CEC), and mainly displayed in the premises of the election administration, provided only neutral information on candidates' profiles and political programmes.

The coverage of the campaign in the media was very limited, without debates among candidates, direct speeches or the presentation of alternative views, which could help the electorate to make an informed choice. Despite fairly equal allocation of free airtime to the candidates, the LEOM media monitoring established that state television allotted over 80 per cent of their relevant news coverage to President Islam Karimov.

While the LEOM did not conduct a systematic observation on election day, its members visited polling station in and around Tashkent and in five other regions. The observers noted a calm voting atmosphere, a frequent presence of law enforcement agents inside polling stations, a lack of uniformity in the preparation of voters lists and multiple signatures on voters lists indicating a pattern of proxy voting. During the vote count and tabulation, observers noted procedural problems and irregularities, such as adjustments of figures which could not be satisfactorily explained and protocols filled out in pencil.

The unusually high turnout of 90,6 per cent reported by the CEC, in particular in light of the small number of voters observed by the mission, raises further concerns regarding the accuracy of the reporting of results.

The full press release is available here: Full Press Statement on the 23 December 2007 Presidential Election in Uzbekistan