Turkmen Journalism Awards for Regime Loyalty

The announcement of awards for journalism in Turkmenistan has caused some confusion, given that only four of the nine people honoured have anything to do with the media.

When President Gurbanguly Berdymuhammedov announced the list of people awarded the title “Honoured Journalist” on October 11, it transpired that four were directors of government TV channels, newspapers and magazine.

The other five included academics specialising in economics and water-industry construction, and the head of a medical centre.

The awards recognised "significant contributions to the development of national journalism in the era of the New Renaissance”, a term which refers tothe period since Berdymuhammedov came to power in 2007.

Commentators say it is unknown what criteria were used to pick the winners. "All we know is that there was no special [selection] commission," a media-watcher in the capital Ashgabat said.

An analyst from Dashoguz in northern Turkmenistan said the awards seemed to be based more on loyalty to the regime than on merit. The winners may have featured in the media, but have not contributed to journalism as such.

Others argue that few journalists working for Turkmenistan’s state media deserve recognition, either.

"How are we supposed to prove ourselves?” a journalist on the Neytralny Turkmenistan newspaper asked. “Our newspaper carries no original content. All we do is print reports from the government news agency."

A reporter on a regional newspaper said there was no genuine journalism in Turkmenistan, and what was rewarded was “servility”, not creativity.

In this environment, he said, journalism awards "do increase competition, not to do more creative work, but to be better at praising the president and ensuring your efforts are noted by those above you”.

Another reporter complained that the awards had little relevance to people like him.

"I’ve been working for 40 years and I’ve never had an award yet, neither with this president nor with the last one [the late Saparmurat Niazov]. Why am I still in the job if I’m so worthless?" he said.

This article was produced as part of IWPR’s News Briefing Central Asia output, funded by the National Endowment for Democracy.