Electioneering

Today sees the Ukraine and Uzbekistan go to the polls. While the former is testament to the country's vibrant democractic culture (difficulties and foreign intereference aside), the latter is a flagrant sham a fact which has been obvious for sometime, as I've noted previously. That said, even Karimov couldn't top the frankly ridiculous excesses of neignbouring Turkmenistan where all the candidates in elections last Sunday based their campaigning on the book Rukhnama by President Saparmurat "Turkmenbashi" Niyazov in which he sets out spiritual and moral guidelines for the country's citizens and where election officials went door to door collecting votes and distributing copies of Niyazov's book, towels and notebooks.