Voters in Kyrgyzstan overwhelmingly backed a new constitution in a controversial referendum last week following deadly ethnic clashes in the ex-Soviet state, the final vote tally showed yesterday.
In Sunday’s referendum, 90.55 percent of voters backed the new charter that would set up Central Asia’s first parliamentary democracy, according to the official results released by the election committee.
Just 8.07 percent voted against, on the back of a mass turnout of 72.24 percent, according to the results.
But opposition leaders have said the results were impossibly high given the fallout from this month’s ethnic violence that left hundreds of people dead in the south of the country.
The referendum also paves the way for Acting Kyrgyz President Roza Otunbayeva’s to be sworn in on Saturday, election committee head Alkybek Sariyev said.
“This means the constitution has come into force. Moreover, Roza Otunbayeva is confirmed as president of Kyrgyzstan,” Sariyev told reporters.
Kyrgyzstan’s provisional government — which came to power in a bloody revolt in April and which has struggled to impose order on the ex-Soviet state — has hoped that the referendum would help legitimize its authority.
The new constitution slashes the powers of the president and sets the stage for parliamentary elections that authorities confirmed on Wednesday would be held on Oct. 10 to bring in a permanent government.
Otunbayeva will serve as president until next year’s elections.
The impoverished Central Asian state, which saw the violent ouster of its only two post-independence governments, has long been considered the most politically volatile country in the region.
Clashes between ethnic majority Kyrgyz and minority Uzbeks last month killed at least 294 people and displaced hundreds of thousands.
Kehinde Sanni spends his days smoothing out dents and repainting scratched bumpers in a modest autobody shop in Lagos. He has never left Nigeria, yet he speaks glowingly of Burkina Faso military leader Ibrahim Traore. “Nigeria needs someone like Ibrahim Traore of Burkina Faso. He is doing well for his country,” Sanni said. His admiration is shaped by a steady stream of viral videos, memes and social media posts — many misleading or outright false — portraying Traore as a fearless reformer who defied Western powers and reclaimed his country’s dignity. The Burkinabe strongman swept into power following a coup in September 2022
‘FRAGMENTING’: British politics have for a long time been dominated by the Labor Party and the Tories, but polls suggest that Reform now poses a significant challenge Hard-right upstarts Reform UK snatched a parliamentary seat from British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labor Party yesterday in local elections that dealt a blow to the UK’s two establishment parties. Reform, led by anti-immigrant firebrand Nigel Farage, won the by-election in Runcorn and Helsby in northwest England by just six votes, as it picked up gains in other localities, including one mayoralty. The group’s strong showing continues momentum it built up at last year’s general election and appears to confirm a trend that the UK is entering an era of multi-party politics. “For the movement, for the party it’s a very, very big
ENTERTAINMENT: Rio officials have a history of organizing massive concerts on Copacabana Beach, with Madonna’s show drawing about 1.6 million fans last year Lady Gaga on Saturday night gave a free concert in front of 2 million fans who poured onto Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro for the biggest show of her career. “Tonight, we’re making history... Thank you for making history with me,” Lady Gaga told a screaming crowd. The Mother Monster, as she is known, started the show at about 10:10pm local time with her 2011 song Bloody Mary. Cries of joy rose from the tightly packed fans who sang and danced shoulder-to-shoulder on the vast stretch of sand. Concert organizers said 2.1 million people attended the show. Lady Gaga
SUPPORT: The Australian prime minister promised to back Kyiv against Russia’s invasion, saying: ‘That’s my government’s position. It was yesterday. It still is’ Left-leaning Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese yesterday basked in his landslide election win, promising a “disciplined, orderly” government to confront cost-of-living pain and tariff turmoil. People clapped as the 62-year-old and his fiancee, Jodie Haydon, who visited his old inner Sydney haunt, Cafe Italia, surrounded by a crowd of jostling photographers and journalists. Albanese’s Labor Party is on course to win at least 83 seats in the 150-member parliament, partial results showed. Opposition leader Peter Dutton’s conservative Liberal-National coalition had just 38 seats, and other parties 12. Another 17 seats were still in doubt. “We will be a disciplined, orderly
RSS