Kenya, Kyrgyzstan, The Broken Sword...

Kenya appears to be going down the wrong track in earnest. Known for a long time as one of the better-doing African states, relatively well developing, stable, relatively free country... It took one fraudulent election (and whatever built up to it) to scrap all those decades' blessings. Took one very old politician (who himself is to be thanked for a lot of achievements) who did not want to leave, and who stirred both emotions and ballot counts to that end, to throw away the cap from Pandora's Box. It is very sad. It is also very disheartening for other, younger, shakier "democracies", less-prized societies to see Kenya in this state.

I am reading Tologon Kassymbekov's The Broken Sword these days. Enjoying it very much. If I read any extract of it at school, I must have just glossed over it. Now, reading it closely, I would want everyone interested in Kyrgyz, Ferghana Valley, Central Asian society and politics to read this great novel. It is not a smooth and fast reading (I don't know how it reads in Russian or in English (there's apparently an English translation, too)), but the Kyrgyz version is not easy. The style is a demanding style, definitely not the kind where you'd say "you won't notice how you finished it". It is about identity and dignity, about political betrayal and fluidity, about parochialism and spiritedness. But very vividly, it is about the style of government and politics, about the political culture of the Kyrgyz, of Central Asians more broadly. Such an eye-opening novel.

The political climate with which we enter 2008 resembles some periods in Kokand khanate at one or another time (for 'times' shifted constantly). President Bakiev is in full charge of all formal political structure. That is all you need. He asks the Parliament to consider removing the Chairman of the Supreme Court, who still had some 6 years to go, according to the Constitution, unless he does some major mistake. No such mistake is cited. Parliament dutifully removes him. A draft of a law is given for Parliament's approval, about the administrative-territorial arrangements; largely an impractical, non-innovative, and economically unjustified (not justified anyhow, really) law. Deputies pretended to discuss it, with some critical remarks (such as, "let a village be called a village it it has 250 inhabitants in it"), and of course, it is approves in the first hearing.

All this may not be that bad. If one views politics in Kyrgyzstan with the hindsight of many decades in the past, including Soviet and pre-Soviet, it appears that representative democracy never really functioned, and whenever tried - mal-functioned notably. But on the other hand, it appears there is a tradition (now vivid, now somewhat hidden) of holding leaders accountable. President Bakiev is taking all the burden of responsibility. "All roads lead to Rome", as it were; all traces of responsibility end up in his office - and that is what he chose knowingly. What remains for him to succeed in living up to his onerous responsibility is for the people to see this, to know that he is the person calling all the shots and hence, answerable for all his shots. The opposition, free from Parliamentary or Government duties, might find a job for itself in helping the people to see this map of responsibility more clearly.