Postcard from Bishkek

For the second time in the last few weeks, I have felt the onset of a cold and retired to the refuge of my apartment.  It was nothing serious, just a rising temperature, but I am told that there is an outbreak of influenza in Bishkek, which is keeping kids away from school, (however, I am not sure how they can tell because the schools have been on their half-term holidays, which combined with the closure in the days leading up to the election and the two days holiday for the Anniversary of Great Socialist Revolution in October 1917 and the Islamic festival of Kurman Ait,, means that schools only opened on Wednesday after a 12 day break).

Ironically, today happens to be World Pneumonia Day.  Now, I do know that Pneumonia is not really connected with colds and influenza; it’s an infection of the lungs caused by bacteria, (and sometimes viruses and fungi, which causes them to fill with liquid, causing coughs and fever, making breathing difficult and can be deadly.  In fact it is the number one killer of children under 5, claiming more young lives than AIDS, malaria, and measles combined.  This is despite the fact that it is preventable and in many cases treatable, and this is often attributed to the fact that pneumonia has been overshadowed as a global health priority by other issues and rarely receives extensive coverage in the media.  Thus, most people remain unaware of the illness, its death toll, causes and means of prevention.

In 2009, more than 100 organizations joined forces to create the Global Coalition against Child Pneumonia and they started the World Pneumonia Day on 2nd November, 2009.  Last year, and this year, it was earmarked for commemoration on November 12th – i.e. today, in order to try and redress the balance, and help to bring the illness back to the forefront of public awareness.

Anyway, I am not surprised because the weather has taken a distinct turn towards Winter, the temperature dropped to below zero and many people have greeted me with comments “Welcome to Winter!” and “Winter has arrived!” Although the arrival of a light covering of snow made Bishkek look pretty, heavy snowfalls have trapped some shepherds and their flocks high in the mountains, and not for the first time this year.

Some residents in parts of Bishkek got a nasty surprise when the central heating got turned off by Bishkekteploenergo, the state run enterprise that pipes hot water to many of the buildings throughout the city.  At first it was said that this was because the Kazakh’s, who supply the gas, had introduced restrictions; but this was denied by both Kyrgyz and Kazakh gas companies and Bishkekteploenergo.  Confusingly, someone pointed out that, as It turns out, Bishkekteploenergo pays for its gas in arrears and currently owes something like 53 million som to the gas company.  I suppose that could have something to do with it …

Bishkekteploenergo are not having a good winter, following the revelations before the election of the “radioactive coal” that it bought from Kazakhstan.  They have now hit back to say that they bought it because it was cheaper than domestically produced coal and, anyway, it was not radioactive, or at least was well within acceptable limits although above what would be the usual background radiation that local citizens might be exposed to.  As I read that I couldn’t help thinking about the same arguments being proposed by supporters of nuclear energy in the UK about the background radiation emitted by the granite racks of Dartmoor and Bodmin moor.  I don’t think people here were any more impressed with the argument than the people of Devon and Cornwall were back then … anyway, the coal has apparently been returned to Kazakhstan.

We are told that we shouldn’t have any trouble with power cuts, (outages), this year as there is ample water in the main Toktogul reservoir, unlike in the previous few winters … unless, that is, people will insist on using electricity to heat their homes.  I suppose they do that because they are cold, and don’t have any other way of keeping warm.  Certainly, in my flat, when there was a problem with the water pipes and we were without heating for a week, I had no choice apart from donning more and more layers of clothing, more and more blankets on the bed – and/or turn on an electric fire.

 

It is a pleasant change to have something other than the seemingly never ending election saga to tell you about.  The saga is not exactly over, yet, but the appeal to the courts to have the results of certain polling station annulled has been turned down by the courts, and although it could go further, it looks as if the final official result will be announced soon. The Election Commission has twenty days to do the tabulation and checking, so we should have the announcement sometime next week. Atambaev will then resume his role as Prime Minister until the inauguration takes place, which should be within thirty days.

Whilst they admit that there some problems or “irregularities” on election day, the commission have been defending themselves and pointing out that there are explanations behind some, (if not most), of the instances that have been brought to their attention.

Which of the super powers is likely to have “caught a cold” as a result of the election is still a moot point.  There is some debate about the future of the Manas transit base and Atambaev is sticking to his guns in saying that he wants it to close in 2014.  Although many people seem to have taken this as a bargaining chip for use in negotiations, there now seems to be an awakening to the possibility that he could actually mean it and, possibly more to the point, as this was clearly his position before the election and part of his “manifesto”, it is going to be difficult to back down without nasty comparisons with Bakiev’s behaviour over the issue.  It might just happen.

In fact, there was an interesting op-ed, published by an independent Russian journalist, which made some pointed comparisons between the circumstances faced by each of Kyrgyzstan’s four presidents, (Akiev, Bakiev, Otunbaeva and President elect Atambaev), suggesting that, for all his faults, Askar Akaev managed to do an awful lot for the country during a difficult time following the collapse of the Soviet Union, and that Atambaev might be hard pressed to match his achievements.  A somewhat controversial analysis and it will be interesting to back in hindsight later on and reassess what he says.

What must be particularly difficult for the Americans is that the Russian airbase at Kant is likely to stay into the 2050’s.  To rub salt into the wound, it seems that, unlike the Americans, the Russians don’t pay any rent and all the utilities, (electricity, gas, water and heating), are met by the Kyrgyz taxpayer.  Apparently there is some talk that these arrangements might be up for discussion, but we’ll have to wait and see.

If that wasn’t enough, then the teams of special forces who come to train their Kyrgyz counterparts, (and apparently run a successful course), probably don’t have to suffer the ignanimity of having their personal belongings, money and evens weapons confiscated from them, and having to pretend it never happened.  Although we in Kyrgyzstan knew about the incident back in 2009, (if it is the same incident I am thinking about), it seems that the rest of the world has only just learned of it as the result of the publication of a Wikileaks cable.

 

If the election saga is not exactly over, at least things are getting back to normal.  At least Vladimir Putin seems to consider that the position in Kyrgyzstan “has normalized” – he said as much after he made an interesting remark about how the Arab Spring “started with Kyrgyzstan”, adding that “the situation will soon normalize in the other states as well.”.

He made those comments at a meeting of the Heads of Government of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, (SCO), in St. Petersburg.  The other piece of news to come out of that meeting that interested me was the decision that next meeting, in 2012, will be held in Bishkek.

Now, I can understand why people might think that, (as running a tour company and operating a hotel), I should welcome such news.  Although that is a great honour, however, we know from previous experience that it also means considerable upheaval.  There is always a shortage of hotel accommodation, streets get closed off as motorcades carrying VIPs whisk by … and so on.  We don’t know the proposed dates yet but hopefully it will this time of year again, because once, when a summit was in the summer months, it created havoc for us.  It certainly wasn’t the “gold mine” that the Rugby World Cup was for New Zealand.  It sometimes surprises me to think how many people seem to think that tourism is a “gold mine” and will be the savior of the economy.  I see that even Columbia has been promoting tourism as a major plank in its economic policy and credit it with improving the country’s image as well as its finances.  That may well have been the case, but I suspect that it took a lot of hard work, effort and investment.  No-one waived a magic wand to make tourists appear and spend their money.

It has to be admitted, however, that there have been tourists this year; we even have some groups now, in November – and, no, they are not skiers.   It seems from the preliminary figures from the National Statistics Committee, that the number of tourists almost doubled this year compared to last year, (which, perhaps is not so surprising because it was a particularly low year as a result of our troubles), and tax revenues almost tripled.  (Mind you, I was not particularly impressed to see, yet again!, what seems to an age old statement that “foreign tourists spend $100 a day during their visit to Kyrgyzstan”.  I have no idea where they get this figure from, but they’ve been quoting it for all the time I have been working in tourism, here.  They haven’t even updated it to take into account t inflation – which is probably just as well because I don’t think it’s true … not even as an average.  Oh, sure, some people pay more per day – but an awful lot pay much, much less.

The International Monetary Fund, (IMF) has been busy this week and released some optimistic figures about the economy.  In particular, they have announced that Consumer Price Index of inflation for the first 10 months of the year stood at just 3.9%, (compared to 18.8% this time last year), and growth in GDP stood at 9%, both of which appear quite impressive. However, the annual projections for both are not quite as good: inflation at about 7.5 to 8% and growth at 7%.  Despite that, if these are accurate, then it shows a notable improvement and offers hope for the future.

One good sign is that trading in the Kara Suu Market, on the border with Uzbekistan not far from Osh, has noticeably increased since Uzbekistan resumed normal working at the border.  Kara Suu is a massive market which used to deal in a lot of Chinese goods which were bought by people visiting from Uzbekistan and was important for the economy of the South.

The IMF have also been making noises in support of the National Bank over the question of special administrative procedures imposed on one of the foreign based banks, pointing out that the National Bank has it procedures that it must follow.

 

In other news, some new monuments have attracted a fair bit of attention.  One is of President Nazarbaev of Kazakhstan.  Is it bad luck to erect a monument to someone who is still living, as someone suggested on twitter?  I think that the Americans have the right idea, if I remember correctly, in that under President Reagan they passed a law saying that statues couldn’t be erected from public funds within a certain period after their death – I have been looking for the reference, but can’t find it.  Kyrgyzstan won’t be the only place with a monument to Nazarbaev as there are examples in Armenia and Turkey as well as in Kazakhstan.

Another was a monument erected to those who fell in the events of April 7th, 2010 at the Ata Beyit memorial in Chon Tash, where 137, (or is it 138), members of the political elite were killed as part of the Stalinist purges, and which was unveiled this week.  The final one is also dedicated to those who fell in the events of April last year and will be placed in the main square, next t the White House.  It’s not finished yet, but the concrete plinths have been constructed and for last week or so we have all been asking ourselves what it is meant to be.  Well, an artist’s impression has been released and could be quite interesting when it is completed, but in its present state at the moment, it looks distinctly unimpressive and ugly.

Down South, it seems that Melis Myzakmatov, the mayor of Osh, is back in the headlines.  Earlier this year he arranged a competition to establish an anthem and a flag for the city.  Now, that’s not unusual here.  Both Bishkek and Naryn, for example, have their own anthems and Bishkek has an official flag.  It seems that the idea behind the competition was to try and build and encourage a sense of civic pride amongst the local population, but some commentators seem to think there is something more “nationalistic” involved.  This concern has been reinforced by the announcement that the mayor wants to establish a local municipal police fprce, independent of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.  He argued that the current agencies are under central control, which often means “political” control, and he wants to stop that.  He wants them to handle issues like juvenile delinquency … which sounds OK, but there were a number of elements in the announcement and subsequent comments in the press, such as the  use of phrases like “special task force”, that are likely to strengthen the unease even further.  However, the Mayor’s press office has expressed its “puzzlement” over the press reports which seem to present comments made in an informal meeting about what the mayor said was “an idea” as a concrete proposal.

It appears that he’s not the only one concerned about the public perception of the police; which here are called the “Militsia”. The Ministry of the Interior wants to follow the examples of Russia and Kazakhstan and even Tajikistan (which considers that this name, inherited from the Soviet Union, implies an nonprofessional force of volunteers and is imbued with traces of corruption), and rename them as: Police.  It’s not just going to be a symbolic, cosmetic change, as they are proposing new training aimed at attacking corruption and the abuse of power, as well as a complete reform of the GAI, the traffic police.

In recent weeks the mining industry seems to have been a recurring theme in the news, and this week was no exception and providing some interesting headlines, one from an Australian company which has been having some difficulties with their operations here that issued an announcement that they have identified several more promising projects in the country, and another that British and Australian investors are interested in developing the Kara Keche coal field in the Naryn region, just to the North of Son Kul.  The International Business Council (IBC) nd the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, (OSCE)< conducted a meeting discussing the “responsible exploitation of mineral resources” which according to the press reports was quite a good discussion of the issues but, unfortunately, I missed it as it was on the day I retired to try and beat off my rising temperature.

Sport has been in the news quite a bit this week.  For example, there was the news that the Kyrgyz Children’s Figure Skating team (consisting of twenty two skaters, aged from as young as six up to thirteen), managed to take four gold, two silvers, four bronze medals and first place in an international competition held in Alamty, in Kazakhstan, against competitors from Russia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Turkey.  There was also a big spread in the popular newspaper Vecherniy Bishkek, (Evening Bishkek), about the swimming team that has also been performing well, but not quite so well.

Another interesting article was a profile of Vladimir Ivanov, a Russian super male model. The reason for the profile was that it appears he was born in Kyrgyzstan, but no one seems to know exactly where.  The funny thing is that on his “profile” it records, “Place of Birth: Kyrgyzstan, Russia”.

This article provided an interesting read this week: Twitter vs. the KGB, (BISHKEK, Kyrgyzstan — On Nov. 2, Nic Tanner seemed like a lucky guy: He’d spent all of three weeks in Kyrgyzstan — an impoverished, landlocked squiggle of a country on the fringes of the former Soviet empire — and had already managed to publish a photo on the homepage of the New York Times. He was…) … I can vouch for this story inasmuch as I saw the tweets.

 

Well if the tourist season is more or less over and the election saga is drawing to a close, then the meetings season has started again in earnest.  This week was quite light because of the two days holiday and then I retired to beat off a cold, (missing one all-day conference), but Friday was a nightmare and I am out off the office for virtually all of next week at one important meeting or another.

At least it looks as if the weather should improve … giving less chance of catching a cold as I run from venue to venue.

 

For the record: more information about World Pneumonia Day can be found on their website: http://worldpneumoniaday.org

 

Postcard from Bishkek: the weekly postcard that I send out as an email also gets posted on the website ianbek.kg each week – and there are other postcards which don’t get sent out.  This week, for example, there were posts about: The secret of Chon Tash, where 137, (or was it 138) members of the political elite were executed as part of the Staliist repressions; Some thoughts about the statistics associated with lPresidential elections;  Kyrgyzstan’s National Library; House Hunting in Bishkek about the efforts of a young American couple who have settled in Bishkek in order to start their company which was filmed for American TV; Shyrdaks – traditional felt carpets and yesterday’s significant date – 11/11/11.

If you decide that you don’t want to receive these postcards in your email anymore, please drop me a line to  and I will take you off the distribution list.  Alternatively, if you know someone who might be interested in being added to the mailing list, then get them to drop me a line and I’ll be happy to do so.