Tajik Opposition Candidate Seeks Consensus
Interview with Oinikhol Bobonazarova, a veteran NGO figure picked to stand against the current president.
Tajik Opposition Candidate Seeks Consensus
Interview with Oinikhol Bobonazarova, a veteran NGO figure picked to stand against the current president.
The main Tajik opposition candidate in this November’s presidential election says she wants a society built on consensus and compromise.
Oinikhol Bobonazarova’s nomination was announced on September 10 the Union of Reformist Forces, a electoral coalition whose main players are the Islamic Rebirth Party (IRP) and the Social Democratic Party.
The decision to pick a figure from the NGO world rather than mainstream politics may in part be intended to attract a wider swathe of the electorate than any one politician could. It may also help calm the fears among some voters about the IRP’s long-term aims – in particular that it might have ambitions to build a theocratic state. (For more, see Surprise Candidate for Tajik Opposition.)
Interviewed by IWPR, Bobonazarova said, “It will be a good, democratic society. Democrats, communists, atheists and Islamists won’t face any problems. The state must always compromise. Compromise is the main precondition for development.”
Shahodat Saibnazarova is IWPR Radio Editor in Tajikistan.
This audio programme went out in Russian on national radio stations in Tajikistan, as part of IWPR project work funded by the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
