Why is Shahin Abbasov of EurasiaNet calling the demonstration in Guba, Azerbaijan "a riot," and why is he saying "The reason for the remarks is not clear, but, apparently, it proved enough to send local men out into the streets."
But the reason was clear, as you can read in Eldar Zeynalov's newsletter and see on Youtube (above) -- it was an accusation by Governor Rauf Habibov that farmers who had sold their land for as little as $40 were "traitors". People were insulted and protested.
The speech was uploaded on Youtube and obviously spread and had an impact, yet Abbasov remonstrates anyone finding any Facebook or Islamic factor in this protest:
Despite much online speculation, though, the protest was neither the work of opposition activists inspired by the Arab Spring, nor Islamists protesting government restrictions against practicing Muslims. Facebook and Twitter reports that similar protests are planned nationwide on March 2 have not been confirmed.
This is ridiculous. When are we going to get over this silly posturing that no protest anywhere ever has anything to do with social media or the Arab Spring spread by it? The reality is, every single protest of any size anywhere these days is influenced by the Arab Spring and by social media. It's now part of the DNA of protest everywhere, spread by the self-same mobile phones and viral social media. Why is there this constant effort to dismiss it and even ridicule those with "the Arab Spring frame"?
Yeah, we get it that these people probably don't even have Twitter, even though they might have cell phones, and Facebook may be an abstraction or poorly represented on the Internet, which itself doesn't have great penetration. So what?! A Youtube was published and that's representative of a culture of transparency and accountability that has spread like wildfire everywhere and which becomes part of the semantics of protest: this official did this bad thing, people caught him on tape, and here he is! Boo!
As for the Islamic factor, that can't be discounted automatically either in a country that has the second highest per capita number of Muslims in the former Soviet Union and where communities inspired by religious ties can form the basis of protest support, even if protests aren't specifically about the closing of a mosque or an arrest of a believer (and more on these in a subsequent post). For example, in January, police raided a flat and seized religious literature in Turkish and Russian and detained some Muslims.
Here's a full account of this protest -- which is largely not a riot although some people did commit violent acts in it -- by Razi Nurullayev (distributed as part of Zeynalov's email publication "Religion in Azerbaijan".
Dear All!
On March 1, security forces have fired tear gas in a bid to quell an outbreak of rioting in the northeastern Azerbaijani city of Quba after the local governor described residents as "traitors. Thousands of protesters had taken to the streets of Quba to demand the resignation of local Governor Rauf Habibov.
The protest action was caused when in his speech earlier this week, Habibov accused Quba residents of selling their "land, families and motherland" for as little as $40. Some local residents were given land by authorities as part of an ongoing agricultural reform, but many are too poor to cultivate them.
He, in particular said: "Quba is a very rich place. Everyone tries to get a place here," Habibov says in the video. "Some men become famous with good deeds, others with bad ones. The Quba people have sold out Quba. The Quba people have sold their lands
for 30 or 40 manats (around $40). Quba has been sold by the ungrateful men of Quba. The men of Quba have sold their nation, their lands, their families."
Habibov met with the protesters earlier on March 1 and offered apologies, but he rejected demands that he step down.
Protesters broke windows at local government buildings and set fire to a private house thought to belong to Habibov.
All of the 14 arrested residents of Guba region arrested have been released, but the Chief Prosecutors office and the Ministry of Internal Affairs later in the evening announced the criminal proceedings to explore the unrest, which may involve new arrests.
Political parties did also voice their concerns about the unrest:
Popular Front Party of Azerbaijan issued a statement saying “this protest action can’t be explained with one excom’s head calling residents “traitors” and by the social concerns. Nevertheless, the residents had had right to raise their protest voice. The action means that the incumbent government has forced people to the direst living conditions as a
result of its negligent attitude and people rose to defend their social, political rights as well as values.
Chairman of Popular Front Party of Azerbaijan, member of the Coordinating Council of the pro-democracy and pro-oppositional Public Chamber Mr. Ali Karimli said: “Of course, one can understand the concerns of the residents; they’re right in their demands. Such a boor and uncivilized man shouldn’t represent the government. He has no right to insult the Azerbaijani nation, Guba residents, who’re the part of this nation and therefore represent the government”. Mr. Ali Karimli, then points out two major elements: first, it is regretful that President Ilham Aliyev did not remove him from the office as soon as he got to know it. It would be better to fire him instead of sending internal troops, quick police regiment to punish the protesters and outline a plan of silencing a dissent voice.
Seemingly, the social problems, concerns, injustice, unfairness have been accumulated for years and peoples’ nerves have been exasperated. The overall situation all over Azerbaijan is not different from the rest of the country. If the reforms are not started in Azerbaijan, the tyranny and arbitrariness of the state officials not prevented, then the rise of all Azerbaijan is a matter of time”
Chairman of “Musavat” party, member of the Coordinating
Council of the pro-democracy and pro-oppositional Public Chamber
Mr. Isa Gambar said: “The core essence of the protest action is that people do not want to put up with the current administrative management and injustice. Truly speaking, the
protest is a model to be potentially happened across Azerbaijan on the whole. The government in a shorter time should draw a good lesson from this. It should not think of repressing the protesters, but rather of solving the problems. The problem is not solely to replace the excom of Guba region, but it should change the whole policy”.
To see the videos and photos go here: http://goo.gl/ 1VIRM
Some information from the Turan Information Agency, Azadliq newspaper and RFERL posts have been used in preparation of this news outlet.
Sincerely,
Razi Nurullayev
Deputy-chairman, Popular Front Party of Azerbaijan
There is another question to ask here: why is this Soros board member so quick to dismiss not only social media, not only the Arab Spring, but also the local opposition?
Clearly the townspeople didn't need some outside instigation or some clearly-tied religious grievance to protest about being insulted for selling their land cheaply if they wished to -- although state oppression of religion forms the backdrop of overall grievances here as elsewhere. And social media *did* is a factor and there have been increasing arrests of Muslims and significant unrest that has to be examined. The opposition made statements about the issue and got involved, so you can't posit some sterile opposition-free space (which is what US democracy deliverers often wish to do as they, with their two-party system, struggle to inculate "big tent" philosophies on countries with multi-party systems and Soviet pasts.)
(BTW, one could point out that socialist land-redistribution schemes in a country with a significant black market and poor resources for real agribusiness can only end this way, as people will take something free and sell it if they can because they don't have resources to farm the land -- which is why they complained.)
Shahin Abbasov, is described as "a freelance reporter in Baku and a board member of the Open Society Assistance Foundation-Azerbaijan" -- the status of which isn't clear as it has been reported as "closing" or "revising its programs" -- I will return to this topic. He's also referenced as "Deputy Chief of Party at the IREX/USAID Media Advancement Project in Azerbaijan" and "a partner in S&A Partnership Ltd, Baku-based privately owned consulting company" (not sure if that's up to date).
