Uzbek Traders Upset at Shop Demolitions

The arbitrary way in which the Uzbek authorities are tearing down shops and cafes which they say were built without permission has angered traders in the eastern city of Namangan.



Even if many of these small trade outlets – some of them self-standing structures and others built as extensions to apartment blocks – were not put up in accordance with planning rules, they have existed over many years, and their owners say the sudden wave of demolitions is unfair and deprives them of their income source.



The municipal authorities launched their demolition campaign after President Islam Karimov visited Namangan, a city of nearly half a million people, in July, during which he remarked that he did not like the look of the city.



As well as shops, cafes, and bakeries set up as small-scale business to meet the demand for local services, other do-it-yourself structures – mainly built onto first-floor apartments – serve as housing.



One interviewee in Namangan said demolition teams had razed 160 businesses outlets so far, and estimated that this had put more than 1,000 people out of work.



“The city looks like there’s been a war,” said the source.



A local man who gave his name as Alisher said his brother’s shop had recently been destroyed.



“The city administration said this was done to improve the appearance of the city, and claimed his shop was an eyesore,” he said. “The shop was providing for my brother’s family and now he doesn’t have the money to build another one somewhere else.”



An official from the mayor’s office, speaking on condition of anonymity, said a decision was taken to take down buildings where owners had failed to comply with regulations.



“There were cafés with the wrong documentation, and shops that fell below the required standards,” he said. “We did warn them, but they didn’t heed us. So the city government was forced into taking these buildings down.”



Alisher, however, is left feeling that the real motive for the demolitions may have been a desire to seek favour with President Karimov.



“I sometimes think that bureaucrats will stop at nothing to please the president,” he said. “The president didn’t like the shops, so they got demolished, and no one cares what the shop owner will do now.”



Namangan is not the first town in Uzbekistan to undergo a forcible makeover.



Andijan, 60 kilometres further up the Fergana valley, has gone through a similar process. One of the city’s suburban districts was cleared of makeshift structures in 2006, and the trees planted in their place soon died.



Even now, says one local observer, “It’s as if a huge tank has rolled through the city crushing everything in its path.”



A new wave of demolitions targeted Andijan’s remaining suburban areas starting this spring.



In the far northwest of Uzbekistan, numerous shops and apartment extensions were destroyed in Urgench over the summer. Even those that had received planning permission were not exempt, and their owners were told things had now changed.



In the historic city of Samarkand in the west of the country, shopkeepers on one of the main central streets received letters in July telling them the buildings were scheduled for clearance, although in this case they were promised land elsewhere by way of compensation.