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http://www.rferl.org/newsline/2005/04/5-not/not-080405.asp End NoteKYRGYZ DEMOCRACY GETS SECOND CHANCE By Eric McGlinchey Kyrgyz President Askar Akaev signed his resignation on 4 April, adding this small and mountainous Central Asian country to the list of post-Soviet autocracies transformed by people power. Yet, while it is tempting to draw parallels between the dramatic events in Kyrgyzstan and the recent revolutions in Ukraine and Georgia, Kyrgyzstan's future may prove considerably more difficult and uncertain. Competing ethnic and regional identities divide the Kyrgyz population and, in the absence of collective leadership, these divisions threaten to reignite the many animosities that have convulsed this strategic Central Asian country in the past. In June 1990, riots between ethnic Kyrgyz and Uzbeks in southern Kyrgyzstan left more than 300 dead. A sudden breakdown in Soviet authoritarian rule and growing economic and political grievances sparked the deadly clashes. Kyrgyzstan today finds itself in a similar situation. Poverty has worsened over the past 15 years and ethnic Uzbeks, who make up one-fifth of the population, remain markedly underrepresented in the newly ascendant opposition just as they were during the Akaev regime. Kyrgyzstan's pronounced regionalism has the potential to heighten these already strained ethnic tensions. Under Akaev's rule, Kyrgyzstan's northern elite monopolized national politics while gingerly attempting to placate the south's divided Uzbek and Kyrgyz populations. Akaev's arbitration of the south's ethnic feuds, though imperfect, did maintain relative calm. With the appointment of Kurmanbek Bakiev as acting president, however, power has begun to shift to the southern Kyrgyz elite. Should Bakiev win the presidential elections scheduled for 26 June and begin to play favorites with his southern Kyrgyz supporters, economic grievances could once again spell violence for this troubled country. A far more desirable outcome -- democracy -- is also possible. True, there has been much hand-wringing about the fact that Kyrgyzstan does not have a united political opposition, that in contrast to the Ukrainian and Georgian choruses of "Yu-shchen-ko" and "Misha-Misha," there is no one person Kyrgyz support. Uncertainty, however, though often a source of conflict, also provides foundations for compromise. And compromise that stresses coalition building rather than one-man rule is what Kyrgyzstan needs after a decade and a half of Akaev's heavy-handed autocracy. Encouragingly, signs of coalition building are already present. The Kyrgyz opposition, now the acting government, has distributed political offices with an eye to more equitable regional representation. Importantly, the opposition has also reached out to the Uzbek minority. The confirmation of Anvar Artykov, an ethnic Uzbek, as governor of the southern Osh region provides a welcome bridge between the titular elite and Kyrgyzstan's Uzbek population. Distributing offices within the executive administration alone, however, will not guarantee a lasting and democratic peace. Crucially, to ensure power sharing persists, Kyrgyzstan's interim leaders must be encouraged to give the parliament jurisdiction equal to or greater than that of the presidential branch. Democracy and strong presidencies have yet to prove a viable combination in the former Soviet Union. In the early 1990s, President Boris Yeltsin defeated Russia's nationalist and Communist legislators by crippling the parliament through a constitutional referendum. Central Asian leaders, also faced with backward-looking parliaments, pursued similar strategies. Problematically, this cure proved worse than the disease -- no longer balanced by parliaments, the Kyrgyz president, like his Uzbek, Kazakh, Turkmen, and Tajik counterparts, quickly gave in to the allure of unchecked executive power. In the early 1990s, the United States and other Western governments supported post-Soviet executives in their struggle against retrograde legislators. These deputies, often holdovers from the communist period, were real obstacles to political and economic change. Kyrgyzstan's current parliamentary crisis similarly threatens to slow political reform. After days of confusion, opposition leaders have reluctantly agreed that the new parliament -- though stacked with old regime loyalists and although its flawed election sparked the revolution -- must be confirmed. It would be a mistake now, just as it was in the early 1990s, for Kyrgyz democrats and their Western supporters to back presidential rule as a fix to the Kyrgyz parliament's temporary ills. If anything, the Kyrgyz parliament must be strengthened. Whereas unchecked presidentialism is zero-sum -- whoever controls the office controls the spoils of state -- parliaments encourage compromise. A strong parliament will reward legislators who can transcend narrow ethnic and regional identities, legislators who can build winning coalitions that are broadly representative of Kyrgyz society. Equally important, a strong parliament will constrain presidential power and ensure that Kyrgyzstan not slide back to the authoritarianism of its Central Asian neighbors. Eric McGlinchey is a professor of political science at Iowa State University.