In 2016, the first president of Uzbekistan, Islam Karimov, died. For twenty-five years he invariably ruled the republic, establishing a strict authoritarian regime. By an unprecedented increase in the influence of law enforcement agencies, he ensured order and stability in the country, but all this was accompanied by a suppression of personality and the dominance of the state in all spheres of public life.
Soviet period
Local propaganda calls his first national leader the father of independence, but until a certain point he retained absolute loyalty to the USSR, going from a simple engineer to the first secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Uzbek SSR.
President of Uzbekistan Karimov was born back in 1938 in Samarkand. He was trained at the Central Asian Polytechnic Institute, after which he began to work at the Tashselmash plant. Then in his career was the Chkalov Aviation Plant, where he worked as an engineer.
In 1966, the novice manager moved to work in the Gosplan of the republic. Here, Islam Karimov began to climb up the career ladder, reaching the post of Minister of Finance and the head of the State Planning Commission. In 1986, he was sent to lead the Kashkadarya region as the first secretary of the Central Committee of the regional committee. Here he established himself as a man of exceptional personal honesty and integrity, which was rare in the eastern republics. After the transfer of the actual leader of the Uzbek SSR, Rafik Nishanov, to Moscow, he became the first secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Republic.
First president
Islam Karimov did not show any special separatist aspirations and actively campaigned the population of Uzbekistan for preserving the USSR in a referendum in March 1991. The administrative resource worked properly, and more than 90% of citizens showed loyalty to the central government.
However, after the August coup, the hard-pressed politician understood the essence of the events and immediately proclaimed the independence of Uzbekistan so that he would not get ahead of power-hungry competitors. In December 1991, the people of Uzbekistan also voted in unison for the republic’s secession from the USSR, which, however, ordered a long life.
Unlike the socialist countries of Eastern Europe, in the CIS, power remained in the hands of the former so-called communists, who instantly changed their political orientation. Particularly revealing was the example of Uzbekistan, where members of the Communist Party in full force joined the People's Democratic Party, headed by former first secretary Islam Karimov.
The 1991 presidential election in Uzbekistan was held on an alternative basis. Karimov was opposed by Muhammad Salih, chairman of the Erk movement. 86% of voters voted for the current chapter, and he led the country.
Islamic issue
President of Uzbekistan Karimov has a difficult legacy. Against the backdrop of a revival of interest in religion, Islamists noticeably intensified, whose positions were especially strong in the Ferghana Valley. To avoid open hostilities, Karimov had to personally fly to Namangan and negotiate with radical leaders, which required great personal courage.
For tactical purposes, he had to promise to fulfill all the conditions of the fundamentalists in future years, but then he severely began to suppress such appearances, squeezing extremists out of the country.
Economy and the Uzbek model
Having a diploma from the Tashkent Institute of National Economy, the President of Uzbekistan recognized himself as a great economist. He even developed a whole national economic model for the republic, the main five provisions of which were to memorize every Uzbek schoolchild. The President of Uzbekistan wrote a book about this, which was carefully studied in the lessons of social disciplines in schools and universities.
Unlike Yeltsin, Karimov did not startle his people with shock therapy, making a gradual transition to market relations. Against the backdrop of rampant crime and lawlessness in Russia and Ukraine, residents of the republic believed that they were lucky, and the President of Uzbekistan is working in the right direction. However, at the beginning of the 2000s, there was a real stagnation in the economy, neighboring Kazakhstan spurred ahead, while the potentially richer Uzbekistan did not show active development.
Today, the main export item is cotton, other agricultural products and natural resources.
It comes to the funny and sad. The country, one of the ten largest importers of natural gas in the world, sharply reduces the distribution of blue fuel to its citizens in winter, especially in rural areas, which is why traditional methods of heating are used - with the help of firewood, dung.
After a stroke, the President of Uzbekistan passed away on August 29, 2016. The funeral took place on September 3. Karimov's successor was former Prime Minister Shavkat Mirziyoyev.