Bakiyev, Kurmanbek

▪ 2006

 On Aug. 14, 2005, Kurmanbek Bakiyev—who had been serving as interim head of state in Kyrgyzstan since March 25, when his predecessor, Askar Akayev, fled the country amid widespread demonstrations protesting government corruption—was sworn in as the country's second president after having received nearly 89% of the vote in the July 10 elections.

      Kurmanbek (Saliyevich) Bakiyev, was born on Aug. 1, 1949, in the village of Masadan in the southern Kirghiz S.S.R. (or Kirghizia, now Kyrgyzstan). After graduating (1972) from the Kuybyshev (now Samara) Polytechnic Institute in Russia, he worked as an electrical engineer until 1990, when he began serving in a series of government posts in southern Kirghizia. In the late 1990s he was governor of Jalal-Abad oblast and then moved to northern Kyrgyzstan, where he assumed the post of governor of Chui oblast. In December 2000 President Akayev appointed Bakiyev to the post of prime minister. He was dismissed, however, on May 22, 2002; Bakiyev reportedly asked Akayev to allow him to return to his former position as governor of Chui but was turned down. The reason for the falling out between the two remained a matter of speculation. After threatening to join the opposition, Bakiyev then ran for a parliamentary seat in his native south.

      After his election to the lower house of the national parliament in October 2002, Bakiyev joined a centrist group that sought to defend the interests of the regions. In September 2004 he became head of the newly founded opposition People's Movement of Kyrgyzstan. This position, coupled with his previous experience as prime minister, made him a likely replacement for Akayev or Prime Minister Nikolay Tanayev after both fled the country in 2005. Though the opposition leadership initially tapped Bakiyev to take over Tanayev's post, Bakiyev was quickly designated head of state as well until a presidential election could be held.

      One of the first tasks of the interim president was to restore public order in the country, particularly to put an end to the looting and destruction of property that had accompanied the collapse of the previous regime. To carry out this task, Bakiyev ensured the release from prison of the popular opposition leader Feliks Kulov, a former top security official. Bakiyev then turned his attention to restoring the economy, which had been in decline for more than a decade, and to trying to reassure the international community, particularly international donors, that Kyrgyzstan was returning to normal.

      International observers assessed the electoral process in the July elections as generally fair, unlike the flawed parliamentary election in February that had precipitated the revolutionary events in March. Bakiyev's problems were far from over, however. The parliament rejected several of his nominees for ministerial posts, and political tensions arose over his dismissal of the prosecutor general, prominent opposition leader Azimbek Beknazarov.

Bess Brown

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