Mammad Mammadzadeh: There is no election race at the political and national level in Azerbaijan

2024-08-08 05:30:11

In an interview, the head of the Election Observation Association, Mammad Mammadzade, spoke about the election environment and election observation missions in Azerbaijan.

Parliamentary elections will be held on 1 September. Half of the election period has already passed. Based on your observations so far, how would you rate the election environment?

The registration period for candidates in the pre-election period has ended. The campaign period is about to begin. Unfortunately, in this period, unlike the 2020 parliamentary elections, no serious progress has been observed in terms of freedom of speech or free assembly. Conversely, more negative restrictive decisions were made. Unfortunately, the pre-election period still has its limits. We are already looking into the complaints of certain candidates regarding the registration of candidates. There are certain pressures from the public sector. Especially among candidates from budget-funded organizations, which are not held back in a certain sense. In general, we see some pressure, albeit at a small level. The current electoral process is limited.

After a month of the election process, the election observation mission of the OSCE Bureau for Institutional Democracy and Human Rights started operating in the country. From that point of view, do the opinions of the international election observation missions regarding the elections in Azerbaijan reflect the reality?

You know, let’s start the presidential elections soon. In recent years, it has become common in Azerbaijan for parliamentary elections and presidential elections to be held consecutively. However, it is technically difficult for international missions to come to Azerbaijan from this summer. But the OSCE will monitor this year’s elections with more than 300 observers. The OSCE observation mission is already here. It is true that the first stage is the pre-election candidate registration period and the campaign period. Then they will follow the voting and post-election process. They could not follow this stage, the candidate’s registration period. But of course, this does not mean that the final report of the ESCE will not be fully detailed. The OSCE is a professional organisation. I am sure that even if they enter the process late, they will have detailed opinions about the election.

How will the independent observation institutions that will observe the elections in Azerbaijan function? How do government officials receive critical reports on non-governmental organizations operating in this area?

Before this, there were several local election observation organizations that observed elections in the country. One was the Education Center for Election Monitoring and Democracy, and the other was the Institute for Democratic Initiatives. Unfortunately, they will not be able to watch these elections. Because their leaders have already been arrested. Of course, the government’s position on this matter is biased. They invite international organizations. It is true that there are obligations. However, they present various obstacles to the observation of local electoral organizations. We look at this, in terms of legislation or politically motivated arrests. In the legislation, local NGOs must register with the Ministry of Justice to carry out surveillance. This step is much more complicated. It is almost impossible now. Another issue is politically motivated pressures. In different ways, local NGOs, here we are talking about independent NGOs. According to the Central Election Commission, two pro-government NGOs are already looking. But they are not independent. Many times before, they gave comments on behalf of the government on the pre-election process. There is talk that the government has already cracked down on non-governmental organizations working on the election that have publicly issued critical reports. Captured or destroyed in some way.

What can you say about the activity of the sociological and imaging services during the election period? Can these services perform activities that meet scientific standards?

You know the election is a competition. This race does not exist in the pre-election process. There is no competition between political parties at the national level. Let’s get to the independent candidates. Independent candidates can certainly compete in 22 days through an image maker. This is another matter. The 22 day election campaign is very limited. But let’s say someone has a certain income or collects donations and uses the image maker service. Even if they use this service in Azerbaijan, it will not affect the election process. The main problem is that equal and fair conditions are not created for pre-election parties. But from a scientific point of view, in other democratic states, of course, the use of these services has a positive impact on the electoral process. They carry out certain methodological and sociological research. They study the opinions of the voters and run a campaign accordingly. Yes, it certainly affects democratic countries.

Voice of America