Turkmenistan: The North Korea Of Central Asia

Serdar Berdimohammedov has recently elected as third president of Turkmenistan in March 2022. 

Son of the second president of Turkmenistan Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov, he had previously served in several other positions within the government of his father.

In 2021, Having won 73 percent of the vote in the 2022 Turkmenistan presidential election which considered to be neither free nor fair, He succeeded his father's 15 year long authoritarian tenure as the third president.

Turkmenistan was formed in 1990 after the collapse of the Soviet Union the small country had lots of oil and gas so life was good for a small segment of their population and on the top of the food chain was him the supreme leader 'TURKMENBASHI' who was the first president of Turkmenistan.

First time he became president during uncontested elections gaining 98 percent of the vote and in the second election in 1992 which was much more democratic.

He had rivals but Turkmenbashi still won. 99.5 percent voters vote for him and later he received the status of head of all the Turkmen of the world at the initiative of the Democratic Party of Turkmenistan.

Interesting things happened during the years of Turkmenbashi rule. The usual set of a dictator, A cult of  personality, 5 hero of Turkmenistan titles for the leader and hundreds of streets named after him. 

A couple of kinda fake revolution attempts used to purge the government from the people who fell from his favour, Almost all Turkmenbashi ministers were eventually arrested except for one man who in 17 years rose from a rural dentist into a Minister of Health who lead the presidency for 16 years the second president of Turkmenistan Gurbanguly Berdimohamedov.

I must talk about the unemployment in the post Soviet Turkmenistan which reached 60 percent according to the unofficial data, The lack of freedom of speech and Hundreds of political prisoners.

All these acts of extreme authorities clearly shows that Bedrimohammadov had been a authoritarian.

Turkmen nationalist with megalomania controlled six million people with an iron fist and single handedly controlled the entire economy of his country.

He set the rule that country know if you are under 40 you cannot leave the country. Citizens after the age of 40 are eligible to flee foreign. Bedrimohammadov didn't threaten the whole world with nuclear bombs like North Korea but he is definitely among the top 10 dictators of the world.

His predecessor Turkmenbashi came up with his own Turkmen  calendar where the month of January was named after Turkmenbashi himself and September after the name of the book he wrote called 'Ruh Nama' (which has very much importance in the country and it is necessary for every citizen to read the entire book every year) He also refused to acknowledge all diplomas of all foreign universities.

He forbade people from walking the streets with golden teeth which a symbol of wealth and achievement in the East. And the most scandalous innovation of the first president was the abolition of pensions for all elderly people who had children. The head of the state considered that in Soviet times pensions were accrued too generously and the state did not need to offer pay. Those who did not have children were asked to give their houses to the state and to move to nursing homes or to prove their 38 years of uninterrupted to work Experience. 

Fortunately the second president of Turkmenistan Mohammadov did not think about such radical reforms. 

The Strangers of his whims is that he ordered for all officials over 40 to go gray-haired and those who cannot do this were forcibly died or fired.

Well this is harmless compared to the loss of Turkmenbashi. Moreover he reversed most of his father's decisions and he didn't have the time to come up with some strange laws.

Mohammadov is a racer, A singer, An athlete, A rider, An artist, A golfer and the defender of the Turkmen nation. And this is only a small part of the leader's hobbies, however in his free time he holds the traditions and claims to take care of the prosperity of Turkmenistan, For this he has been awarded with many medals which includes this list. The award for great love for independent Turkmenistan and love for the homeland.

Other nations also rewarded him and for some reasons.

He has modern 2000 honorary titles, Well what does Gurbanguly Mohammedov enjoy more than getting medals and titles.

The second president loved writing books. He is an author of more than 30 books and each of them immediately became compulsory for study in Turkmenistan. 

Why Mohammadov did this? Apparently this is how he dominated and showed his power for the resistance of sublime dictatorship.

These are the tactics which authoritarian country can use to maintain their supreme authorities.

Mohammadov personally assembled a high speed SUV and drove it around the "gates of hell."(And you know I'm kind of convinced it looks freaking cool) Mohammedov loves horses in particular. His grandson dedicated a song to his beloved horse.

2 years ago Gurbanguly Bedrimohammedov became famous for his attitude towards coronavirus, He advised residents to inhale the smoke of garble at home for the Prevention of coronavirus disease and then he simply banned the world. Oddly enough it worked there wasn't a single case of the COVID-19 in the country.

Because of all the above mentioned strange laws and insanely strict strategies to restrict the Turkmen nation, Turkmenistan is not a place to live with freedom of speech and it's considered by many to be one of the strictly authoritarian countries in the world.

It's not much funny. It's socially North Korea. The only thing where Turkmenistan stands different from North Korea is probably its foreign policy. Which stands quite fair. Here's the reason why you don't really hear about Turkmenistan as often as about North Korea in the news. 

This is also the reason why a lot of you who are reading this blog are probably reading about this country or about the fact that this country is authoritarian is like North Korea for the first time is because they don't do anything politically. 

Turkmenistan really doesn't even have any enemies and it doesn't really have any friend-zoned allies.

Pretty good relations with any countries by just not doing anything and just being quiet.

So Turkmenistan just doesn't care. It's cool with all of its neighbors and they just can continue being the author retiring oppressive government that they are without anybody even trying to do anything and nobody ever talks about it in the news because nobody cares. It's not like North Korea that says that they're going to nuke the US every single other day they're just chillin and the president is doing pretty fine. 

I think Kim Jong Un can learn these things from this post Soviet authoritarian country. I wish freedom and prosperity to the Turkmenistan people but looking at the things that right now it's probably gonna take a very long time to achieve that.

Because of all the above mentioned strange laws and insanely strict strategies to dictate the Turkmen nation, Turkmenistan is not a place to live and it's considered by many to be one of the strictly authoritarian countries in the world.

It's not much funny. It's socially North Korea. The only thing where Turkmenistan stands different from North Korea is probably its foreign policy. Which is quite better and balanced. Here's the reason why you don't really hear about Turkmenistan as often as about North Korea in the news. 

This is also the reason why a lot of you who are reading this blog are probably reading about this country or about the fact that this country is authoritarian is like North Korea for the first time is because they don't do anything politically. 

Turkmenistan really doesn't even have any enemies and it doesn't really have any friend-zoned allies.

Pretty good relations with any countries by just not doing anything and just being quiet. So Turkmenistan just doesn't care. It's cool with all of its neighbors and they just can continue being the author retiring oppressive government that they are without anybody even trying to do anything and nobody ever talks about it in the news because nobody cares. It's not like North Korea that says that they're going to nuke the US every single other day they're just chilling and the president is doing pretty fine. 

I think Kim Jong Un can learn these things from this post Soviet authoritarian country. 

I wish total freedom of speech and prosperity to the Turkmenistan people but looking at the things that right now it's probably gonna take a very long time to achieve that.