Turkmenbashi Meets His Maker

Saparmurat "Father of the Turkmen" Niyazov, 66, the semi-godlike leader of the gas-rich Turkmenistan, passed away last night, Reuters reports.

His sudden death after twenty years of rule over the Central Asian former Soviet Union republic reduces the cadre of Gorbachev-era Genghis Khans down to two, Islom Karimov of Uzbekistan and Nursultan Nazarbayev of Kazakhstan. It leaves the bereaved country with a grotesque personality cult that rivals Stalin’s.

The late President-for-life Niyazov can be rightfully considered a 21st-century embodiment of Big Brother.

Turkmenbashi, whose highfalutin self-title has made him political shorthand for authoritarianism, followed his subjects almost everywhere. He followed them on the streets and in facilities that bear his name; in parks and squares that exhibit his statues; in pockets full of — or rather, not-so-full-of — manat, the Turkmen national currency that glorifies his face. In fact, the Turkmen may not be the only people he pursued in this universe. A meteorite named after him may well be carrying some sort of ambassadorial aura to extraterrestrial civilizations.

Back on earth, Turkmenbashi’s communication strategy reached way beyond his realm. With “Ruhnama,” an ultra-Leviathan farrago of folklore and philosophy, Niyazov took a dive into the global book business. Thanks to a steady stream of gas revenues, this supposedly ghostwritten masterpiece has been translated into 30 languages. What a way to spend money!

“Ruhnama,” a must-read for the pubescent Machiavellis of the world, comes as a red-blooded addition to the “Despot Dreamers” library of such works as Mao Zedong’s “Little Red Book,” Kim Il-Sung’s “Juche,” and Kuchma’s “Ukraine Is Not Russia.” Sascha Baron Cohen should be gnashing his teeth for picking the wrong country.

Niyazov walked out of this life having secured a higher rate for gas exports to Russia. Starting next year, Russia will shell out $100 per 1000 cubic meters, up from $60.

A tight and highly profitable web of interrelationships characterizes Eurasian politics. Through the Russian pipeline, Turkmenistan supplies most of the gas consumed in Ukraine. Russia, in turn, exports its own gas to Europe through the Ukrainian pipeline, while importing cheaper gas from Turkmenistan to cover domestic demand.

Questions abound: Will Vlad the Impaler manage to drill his proboscis into a demoralized gas kingdom? What’s in the pipeline for Ukraine? How will Turkmenbashi’s death affect Europe’s energy equation? Hopefully, one day the people of Turkmenistan will wake up and put their idols where they belong.

PRUyal Pageant Blemished by Senior Seeking “Better Living Today”

I see skies of blue..... clouds of white
Bright blessed days....dark sacred nights
And I think to myself .....what a wonderful world.
Louis Armstrong “What a Wonderful World”

Not all went according to plan at a gala event marking the 100th Day of the Anticrisis Coalition. As the glitterati took turns in mounting the rostrum, one could probably hear the hissing sound of static electricity that accompanied this ego-stroking parade.

Resting on the laurels of fame was Premier Victor Yanukovych, the “Queen of the Night.”

Had he developed as much — or as little — appreciation of Western culture as Kim Il Sung or Saddam Hussein had, that night we would have heard him humming that famous Louis Armstrong song.

The speech he delivered glorified the many achievements of his Cabinet, such as getting a good deal from Russia on natural gas supplies for FY 2007 and lessening the pain at the pump by having fuel traders agree to voluntary price cuts. (He failed to mention that the former comes at a certain geopolitical price, and that the latter perfectly corresponds with the seasonal slowdown in world demand for oil.)

One of the exit lines he threw at the audience was “work is being done to expand the coalition.” (Well, if we heed the latest news, NSNU has once again settled its orientation in favor of an opposition role. Don’t be a menace to NSNU while drinking your juice in the hood.)

Rather than allowing closer contact with his voters, these days Yanukovych takes far more interest in achieving greater control over enterprises in which the government has a majority stake — through the practice of populating their management with his associates.

In fact, the miracle man who promised us BLT (“Better Living Today”) has now updated his vocabulary with words like populism and squandermania.

Just when he was done with impressing the hell out of the audience and was about to retreat from the rostrum, the moment of truth came.

Straight out of the blue, an unidentified senior citizen came flying down the aisles like a fighter jet, repeatedly calling Yanukovych by name, in a squeaky voice full of distress. Not even a Cabinet “janitor” like Anatoliy Tolstoukhov could prevent him from storming the stage, where he hoped to make physical contact with his idol.

But guess what? The idol took immediate evasive action and fell back to base, at full speed, in a tsarlike manner. His reaction to the man he left behind? Zero.

No one knows exactly how that passionate elderly man had landed on the invitation list, in the first place. But, according to the media, he meant Yanukovych no harm and merely intended to hand him a grievance letter. Presumably a Yanukovych supporter, he had a problem that he believed Yanukovych could solve. Well, it wasn’t his day. By the time his expeditionary tactics had propelled him on stage, no one was there for him, except for the security detail. So much for BLT.

This episode echoes Jimmy Carter’s infamous swamp rabbit encounter.

Yet, comparatively speaking, Carter comes across as more of a well educated idealist than an undereducated elitist, a role more suited for Yanukovych.

So, at the risk of being accused of overstating the case, the question would be: Does the man who enjoys the highest approval rating in Ukraine derive it from respect for the little man? Telltale episodes like this suggest that even America’s highest paid image makers cannot erase some deeply-seated power distance values that our dignitaries have to live with.