Blood
Ballot Of Chechnya
By Roshan Muhammed
Salih
02 September 2004
Aljazeera
Alu
Alkhanov's "victory" in the Chechen presidential elections
on Monday was a farce that will not solve the region's political and
security crises, analysts say.
The Kremlin-backed
candidate won a crushing victory in the presidential vote last weekend,
but there were questions over how election officials managed to report
high turnout figures when polling stations had often been deserted.
The election was forced by the May assassination of the former Chechen
president by separatists who have been fighting Moscow for independence
for a decade.
With all the votes
counted, Alkhanov had reduced the other six candidates to the status
of also-rans by garnering 73.48%, according to local election officials.
His nearest rival, Movsur Khamidov, polled only 8.94%.
But observers say
the elections were neither free nor fair, and without a broader-based
political process Chechnya is doomed to more bloodshed.
Following his election
victory, Alkhanov, a career police officer, vowed to consign "separatist
extremists to the dustbin of history".
He earmarked security
as his top priority and reiterated the Kremlin's stance against negotiations
with separatist leader and former Chechen president Aslan Maskhadov.
The extremists "may kill and make explosions, but the will of the
people has thrown them into the dustbin of history and Maskhadov has
chosen this way himself. The talk of the imaginary legitimacy of Maskhadov
is misplaced," Alkhanov said.
He also vowed to maintain the policies of assassinated president Akhmad
Kadyrov, a pro-Moscow former rebel, "to rebuild the economy and
assure security for the inhabitants of Chechnya".
However, Daniel
Pellathy, of the American Committee for Peace in Chechnya, told Aljazeera.net
that Alkhanov must stabilise the security situation to accomplish his
goals, but will be unable to do so without including the rebels in the
political process.
"However much
Moscow may dislike it, they can't keep excluding people who have support,
political goals and guns, from the negotiating table," he said.
"It is true
that the rebels have been linked to murders and acts of terrorism but
probably only in equal proportion to those carried out by the federal
forces."
He added: "It
is not as if the rebels are international jihadists who hate the West
and the very concept of civilisation. They have clear political goals
based on nationalism and ethnicity. They are people that it is possible
to negotiate with."
Before the elections,
the rebels decried the process as a sham.
A rebel website
said the Russian government "has been trying to impose an undemocratic
system in Chechnya for over five years".
"At this moment
any elections in Chechnya are impossible. President Maskhadov and the
Parliament of Chechnya are ... the only legitimate government under
these circumstances," a statement on the website said.
"Maskhadov
and [radical Islamic] Wahhabism have no future in Chechnya"
Kavkazcenter.com added elections are impossible with 80,000 Russian
soldiers in the country, when travel is restricted all over Chechnya,
and when there is no independent mass media.
Their protestations
seem to be borne out by most observers.
The respected Russian
rights group Memorial said the "election should be declared null
and void due to the weak participation. Everything else is just falsification."
The Russian press also expressed incredulity at the result.
"The
name of the winner was known in advance," said the daily Kommersant.
And Tanya Lokshina of rights organisation Moscow Helsinki Group said:
"Alkhanov's de facto appointment as president, in effect dictating
to the Chechen people who should be their representative, will not lead
to lasting peace."
On the other hand,
local election officials vehemently denied charges of foul play, saying
international observers like the Arab League had given their blessing
to the vote.
If journalists had only seen empty polling stations "then you managed
to arrive at the wrong moment, these things happen", said the republic's
top election official Abdul-Kerim Arsakhanov.
Nevertheless, author
of two books on the Chechen conflict Tom de Waal, of London's Institute
of War and Peace Reporting, said Alkhanov has even less support in the
region than Kadyrov had.
He told Aljazeera.net:
"Kadyrov had some measure of authority and was his own man to a
certain extent. He had a power base in the region and the deal was that
he would support Moscow in the big picture if Moscow allowed him to
have a certain measure of autonomy in running affairs in Chechnya.
"But I think
Alkhanov was chosen because there wasn't anyone else fit to perform
the role. He doesn't have the power base in Chechnya that Kadyrov had."
De Waal said the
election has further alienated the Chechen people from politics in general.
"There is just
no trust anymore. People by and large have been turned off politics.
It is difficult to say how much support anyone really has in the region
but I would guess that Maskhadov and the rebels have between 10 and
20% of the popular support, another 10% are pro-Moscow and the rest
of the people are just war-weary and fed up."
"There is just
no trust anymore. People by and large have been turned off politics
... people are just war-weary and fed up"
He added: "The only way forward is to have a broader political
process and some international observers on the ground so that ordinary
Chechens can be assured that the human rights situation is being monitored."
Tens of thousands
were killed in the first Chechen conflict from 1994 to 1996. Russian
President Vladimir Putin sent troops back into the mainly Muslim territory
on Russia's southern fringes in 1999 to cement his image as a strong
leader ahead of his own election.
But victory over the rebels has eluded Putin, now in his second term,
and the killing of Kadyrov - Putin's iron man in the region - was a
blow.
Separatists have
promised to dole out the same fate to Alkhanov.
"Like last
time, the authorities will be signing the death warrant of the man they
pick. Neither elections, nor Russia's current politics in Chechnya will
bring the desired results," rebel envoy Akhmed Zakayev said in
a recent statement.