The President of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, in an interview with "Vremja" program on Russia's First Channel said, "Maybe not all are glad with the sovereignty of Azerbaijan. For the future of the country it needs new opposition; literate and modern." He emphasized that Azerbaijan needs an opposition that will "think about the interests of the population, criticize authorities, offer something, and achieve this through constitutional means."
While some citizens and political analysts agree with Aliyev, a close look at the Parliamentary elections, both in 2005, and also 2000 and 1995, shows that the political struggle in Azerbaijan cannot be so simply explained. For analysis of the characteristics of the present elections and registration of factors of innovation it is pertinent to compare Azerbaijan's most recent Parliamentary elections with previous Parliamentary elections.

10 years ago, 5 years ago...

The Parliamentary elections of 1995 were conducted utilizing a mixed system: 100 - majority and 24 proportional mandates. From 12 parties who submitted documents in a proportional system only eight were admitted to the elections. Two parties, The People's Front and National Sovereignty, represented the democratic opposition. ("Musavat" and some other opposition forces were denied participation.) For 100 majority mandates 1040 candidates wished to contend, but the Central Election Commission (CEC) admitted only 387. Among them only 10% were candidates from the opposition, others including formally non-partisan candidates were supporters of the authorities. Results of the elections were totally falsified. Parliament was actually "elected" in accordance with lists prepared by the presidential apparatus. The opposition in general received only 10 mandates.
The Parliamentary elections of 2000 were again held on a mixed system, with the same proportion of majority and proportional mandates. Over 20 parties wished to participate in the elections, but only 13 could present registration papers to the CEC in time. At first the CEC admitted only five parties into the elections, leaving out "Musavat", The Liberal Party of Azerbaijan and The Democratic Party of Azerbaijan. Later, at the insistence of the USA and Europe, all 13 parties joined in struggle for votes of electors. Of the 13 parties that participated in the elections on a proportional system seven represented the camp of the democratic opposition and the other five were supportive of the incumbent regime. For 100 majority mandates 1040 candidates wished to contend, but the CEC admitted only 409 into the elections. And, as in 1995, most of the majority candidates were representatives or supporters of authorities - about 320 out of 407. The elections were held in a regime of total falsification (according to the lists of authorities). The opposition, who "won" 15 mandates, made a joint decision not to recognize results of elections. Musavat, PNNA and PNFA ("classics") rejected mandates. As a result in the new Parliament the opposition camp was represented by only 10 deputies (nine from PNFA, three are from party of citizen solidarity and one is from "Yurddash").

...10 years later

The Parliamentary elections on November 6, 2005 were held on a majority system with 125 one-mandate election districts. The CEC registered practically all of the candidates and the resulting figure was a record - over 2063 candidates. It should be noted however, that before elections this figure, as a result of voluntary and compulsory resignation, as well as court-ordered cancellations, decreased to almost 1544. Main political forces united into political blocks. Main contenders were the ruling party "New Azerbaijan" and the leading opposition block "Freedom" (including "Musavat", The People's Front and Democratic parties). On free televised campaign time that given to over 60 candidates even more opposition blocks were revealed, "New politics" and "National Unity" (Liberal party). From the leading party over 430 candidates participated in the elections. In general 2/3 of registered candidates were obvious or hidden supporters of the leading elite, and the other approximately 1/3 were representatives of the opposition and independent candidates. Finger inking and exit polls were used in the elections for the first time.
In spite of the fact that the present election process was held in an atmosphere of intense pressure from international organizations, and amidst a backdrop of raised revolutionary anticipations in society, and also in spite of the number of innovations (the cancellation of the proportional system in a favor of the majority system, finger inking, exit-polls, the unprecedented quality and quantity of candidates, the presence of observers, and so on) the attitude towards the elections of the leading elite and the behavior model of the authority did not change significantly.
Before the beginning of the election campaign the president and his advisors attentively listened to all the wishes of international organizations and assured them that all conditions to hold open and honest elections in Azerbaijan would be created. The leading regime did not question the observance of general norms of democracy at this stage. During this preliminary stage the head of the country, Ilham Aliyev, demonstrated publicly to the international community a sincere predisposition towards "Western democracy" and preparedness to project its norms upon the Azeri elections. Some of his steps in this direction included liberation of the "Prisoners of October", amnesty for all political prisoners, removal of a moratorium on rallies and the imitative decree from May 11 that promised the most honest and fair elections.
In the first stage (adoption of the jurisdictional base of the elections, promotion and registration of candidates) of the elections however, the behavior of the authority fully changed. At the same time the president himself appeared to recede into a shadow, and the presidential apparatus, the leading party "New Azerbaijan" and incumbent deputies of Parliament actively and publicly realized his commands. At this legal stage of the elections the authority, acting as if it had caught amnesia, forgot all of its promises. During discussion of the legal base of the elections the authority demonstratively ignored almost all the proposals of the Committee of Venice, supporting this with propagandist theories about the sovereignty of the country, specifics about the development of democracy in Azerbaijan and so on. At this leading stage, through the use of these pseudo arguments, the authority was creating within the elections a legal base that again would providing it with the widest opportunities for falsifications of the results. In order to soften the disappointment of international organizations and Azerbaijan's society the authority held the first stage of the election campaign on the highest imitative level, most notably simplifying the procedure of promotion and registration of candidates. As a result the number of registered candidates reached a fantastic figure - 2063, more than five times surpassing the same figure in the previous Parliamentary elections. In spite of the obvious non-correspondence of the election legislation to the standards of democracy decreed by the president on May 11 and the "registration liberalism" the CEC gave society and a number of international organizations certain optimism regarding perspectives of the present election process. But further events showed that all these steps by the authority were simply imitative character.

The essence of the authority are stability and conservatism

At the second stage of the election campaign (the stage of pre-election campaigning) the president of the country again appeared to be in a shadow, but the leading regime demonstrated frank reactionary behavior ignoring even its own legal base of the elections. Official mass media created not only a campaign of "Black PR" against the opposition, but used a whole arsenal of revolutionary charges against the opposition. And in this the regime was not original.
During the campaigning period of the Parliamentary elections of 2000 the head of a regional department of the "Musavat" party and the chief editor of popular opposition newspaper "New Musavat" were arrested on charges of attempting to hijack a passenger plane. Arrested in front of all the democratic opposition they were incriminated on charges of political terrorism and planning to destabilize and over-throw the government.
During the most recent elections there was a similar political show revolving around Rasul Guliyev. Guliyev, a former speaker of Parliament, was attempting to return to Azerbaijan from exile when a plot between him and several inner-authority oligarchs to start a revolution was revealed by government authorities. This repressive and propagandist show gave a start to massive staff firings and arrests, and signaled the intentions of the authorities to act in a repressive way after the elections.
In the second (decisive) stage of the election campaign predetermined destiny of the elections was exhibited. Not incidentally this stage was intense and sensitive among main participants in the election process. The West deceived in their democratic anticipations publicly demonstrated irritation about the uncompromising and reactionary behavior of the authority, and urgently recommended it to introduce necessary legal and procedural changes into the election process. Opposition angered by such a course of events expressed its disappointment through threats of rallies, revolution and even a boycott of the election results. And the authority frightened by all of this desperately defended won legal boundaries, trying to "to pay off" critics with concessions. Negotiations led only to some turning of the "counterrevolution scenario" of the authority. On the eve of elections the leading regime adopted some recommendations from the West including finger inking, the sanctioning of NGO monitoring of the elections, and so on. At the same time though, they maintained control over the election process. As always, it happened in the form of "proscenium of the savior to people": again the president came to save the day, soothed world, and publicly making a number of imitative steps (for example, his decree from October, 25).
In the election strategy and model of behavior of the "Aliyev" regime no significant positive innovations were observed. The same imitative practice, the same reaction spirit, the same falsified (antidemocratic) methods of holding of elections struggle could be viewed.

"Wide usage of administrative resources in favor of candidates from the authority
"Active interference of executive and law-enforcement forces in the elections process, open support of certain candidates by them.
" Obvious violations of the principal of providing equal opportunities for all of the deputy candidates (in televised campaigning time, the organization of meetings with electors, etc.)
" Systematic violations of the norms of democracy, laws, the Constitution and the election code.
" Ignorance of decrees made by the president on May 11 and October 25.
" An environment of political pressure forcing many candidates to quit campaigning, or court removal of them from the campaign circuit (more than 500).

Results that no one was waiting for...

On November 6 the long awaited Parliamentary elections in Azerbaijan were conducted. The massive competition among 1544 candidated for 125 seats in Parliament in a majority system finally drew to a close. The leading party "New Azerbaijan" won the most mandates, followed closely by a large group of independent candidates. Only a handful opposition candidates from various blocks won mandates. In general the elections were held in a quiet atmosphere, and according to data from the CEC 46% of electors participated in the elections.
During the tallying of votes became clear that the elections were held in the typical environment of falsification, as in the previous elections of 1995 and 2000.

According to the initial results of the elections the distribution of deputies' places in Parliament looked like this:

Leading party "New Azerbaijan" - 63 mandates
Independent candidates - 44 mandates
Democratic opposition (block "Freedom") - 6 mandates
Pro-government parties - 5 mandates
Moderate opposition parties - 5 mandates

Results of the elections received wide resonance throughout the world. In the joint statement of the mission of the OSCE, PACE and NATO the elections were recognized as not corresponding to international standards and democratic obligations of Azerbaijan. They reported irregularities in the results of the elections in approximately 43% of election districts and called on authorities in Azerbaijan to investigate all cases of violation and punish the guilty.
The opposition ("Freedom" block, "New Politics" block, and "National Unity" block) refused to recognize the falsified results of the elections and declared the beginning of a consolidated struggle for cancellation of the results and new Parliament elections. Two days later after the elections on November 9 a rally led by the unified strengths of democratic opposition noted the beginning of a new phase of political struggle.
Under pressure from the disappointed West, opposition and society, the leading regime was compelled to begin the process of correcting some of the results of the elections. For several post-election days the CEC reconsidered several mandates in favor of candidates from the opposition raising their quantity from six to 11. In some districts they cancelled results and declared new elections. The leading regime noted its willingness to reconsider the results of the elections in approximately 10 districts. But the opposition also insisted on reconsideration of all the results of elections or at least 100 of the 125 districts. The West insisted on continuation of the process of investigation. As an orientation figure they pointed to the evaluation of the OSCE that states falsifications and/or irregularities were observed in 43% of election districts.
Currently the process continues. What remains to be seen is will all interested parties (the authorities, the opposition and the West) be able to maintain the current situation in the vein of a peaceful legal process. Can they reach a mutually satisfactory version of the election results, division of the "mandate pie" and the removal of intense one-sided political pressure in the country? Or could the events develop as they did in Georgia and Ukraine, or Kyrgyzstan?