Kyrgyz parliament could be dissolved over government infighting - source
BISHKEK. Feb 4 (Interfax) - There is a possibility the Kyrgyz Parliament will not fulfill its constitutional mandate expiring this fall and will be dissolved as early as this spring, a source within the parliamentary majority coalition told Interfax on Wednesday.
The dissolution of the parliament is possible in the event of a governmental crisis and none of the parliamentary factions being able to form a new coalition, he said.
"What points to the start of a crisis is the recent conflict between the chief of the Kyrgyz presidential administration, Daniyar Narynbayev, and Justice Minister Almambet Shykmamatov, who is a candidate from the pro-governmental Ata-Meken (Motherland) Party, and the planned government reshuffles which members of the ruling majority might not back," he said.
"If the coalition members from the Social-Democratic Party, Ar-Namys (Dignity) and Ata-Meken fail to reach an agreement on new Cabinet candidacies, which might include even deputy prime ministers, one of the factions could announce its withdrawal from the coalition and then a new configuration will have to be formed," the source said.
"Effectively, only three coalition factions are stable parliamentary factional units. They already collapsed last year but then formed another alliance, while the opposition parties Respublika and Ata-Zhurt (Fatherland) split into groups for ideological reasons, and it would be unnatural if they suddenly began forming into their factions," the source said.
It is because the opposition factions are too small, and deputies who are neither in the coalition, nor in opposition are unable to re-join them, that is it is almost impossible to form a new majority, which means that early dissolution of the parliament might be the only solution, the source said.
Other parliamentary sources confirmed that many parliamentarians, especially from the parliamentary opposition, are getting ready for early dissolution and new elections which could be held as early as this spring.
Meanwhile, other deputies believe that the Kyrgyz Parliament will see its mandate through, and the next elections be held on time, i.e. this fall, as President Almazbek Atambayev repeatedly pointed out.
The Kyrgyz parliament consists of 120 members who form five parliamentary factions. The ruling majority holds 69 mandates.
A day earlier Justice Minister Shykmamatov resigned after refusing to apologize to the chief of the presidential administration for words attributed to him by the media.
Last week local media reported that Shykmamatov had alleged that the Kyrgyz prosecutor general, Aida Salyanova, resigned over "political games" of the chief of the presidential administration. For his part, Narymbayev demanded that Shykmatov publicly apologize at a meeting of the ruling parliamentary coalition. The justice minister denied saying these words.
Salyanova, who had served as the Kyrgyz prosecutor general since March 2011, tendered her resignation on January 19. Sources in law enforcement authorities linked the move to a criminal inquiry into abuse of office and fraud, in which her husband, Bakyt Abdykaparov, is involved.
The inquiry is led by the State National Security Committee. Salyanova's husband works as an assistant to the Kyrgyz justice minister.
On January 20, Salyanova said in an interview with Radio Azattyk, the Kyrgyz branch of Radio Liberty, that "everything that was said about my husband is a lie, when the time will comes, all circumstances will become public domain."
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