When the plane was about to land at the Chisinau Airport, I have been feeling like returning back to Baku after 2 years European tour. These feelings grew stronger once I was entering into the city, watching typical “Chrushovka” or other Soviet style blocks of Chisinau. However, the last several years’ construction boom in Baku was not being observed here.
After 3 months assignment in the Conflict Prevention Centre of the OSCE, the first task assigned me in the Mission to Moldova was to support Political Advisor in dealing with Gagauz issue. It was within my responsibility to observe the pre-election situation in Gagauz Autonomous Unit of the Republic of Moldova and come up with regular updated information and findings from observation of the situation.
Gagauzia has ever been an uncommon and atypical place to us. This is not because of its far-off location, but because it has hardly ever been mentioned in both scholastic literature and public media in Azerbaijan. Honestly, I have never felt like searching out something about this beyond recall Turkic nation even from boundless internet. Within the second assignment period of the JPO Programme, in the Mission to Moldova I had this incredible chance.
Gagauz is the fourth largest ethnic group in Moldova, however, this minority group doesn’t insist on independence unlike the remaining ethnic population – Russians, Ukrainians. Gagauz, a total of 153.000, resided in the southern Moldova. They are the descendants of Turkic Oğuz tribes converted to the Orthodox Christianity. The rural Gagauz were largely russified nation during the Soviet reign and still Russian language is mostly used in the enclave. This small Turkic ethic group has been affected by “Russification” policy much more than Azeri Turks and other Central Asian Turkish Countries. Language at the universities, schools, state and private institutions are Russian. I found it amazing that 70-80 percent of Gagauz reported Russian as their second language, while very few – 4 percent of Gagauz said they were fluent in Moldovan.[1]
Cultural and language problems are supposed to be partially linked to the social troubles as well. Gagauz is assumed to be one of the most indigent ethnic populations of Moldova. Small trip from the north to the south is enough to behold the wretched living of the Gagauz people. The roads taking to different villages of Gagauzia seem to be repaired last time in Soviet period. One faces here locals using still horses and carriage as ubiquitous transport. Not only common people, but also local authorities suffer from the lack of financial resources. A good proper example I discovered during the elections to the People’s Assembly of Gagauzia. Because of financial problems, the Gagauz Central Election Commission was able to print out ballot papers only in Russian, although they had to be published in Gagauz and Moldovan languages. Probably, it is a result of low social condition that the prices here are pretty cheap. If you want to visit Gagauz History Museum you need to spend just 2 Lei (about 0.12 EUR). The local leadership sees the reason of poverty in the negligence of Chisinau to the sufferings of autonomy. Some Gagauz newspapers write that even international assistance is not usually equally distributed among all Moldovan citizens. Recently, local newspapers were questioning why Rumania’s aid has not been delivered to disadvantaged Gagauz people. International community lacks to render direct assistance to the region as well. Turkish Government is a single country having realized some assistance projects, inter alia, water pipe construction, road network repair, etc. Most recently, Russian Federation delivered humanitarian aid to Gagauzia, to help out poor locals suffered from last year’s draught. Nonetheless, the Moldovan government imposed a ban on the Russian aid arguing that delivery of external aid during pre-election period would have fortified the image of Gagauz leadership.
After the downfall of Soviet Union, the Gagauzia proclaimed their independence from Moldova, which resulted with an outbreak of conflict in the late 1980s. The dispute in Gagauzia and Transnistria are fully at odds, at least, in terms of their duration, political importance and the level of external support. While Transistrian conflict has linguistic roots, Gagauz conflict was a typical ethno-territorial conflict. Interestingly, despite its ethnic trait conflict in Gagauzia has not lasted long and been settled with granting the region a special autonomous status in the late 1994, whereas Transistrian conflict still keeps going. The other difference between them is that in Transnistria’s case, demand to remain under Soviet (later Russian) administration broke out the conflict. In Gagauz’s case, the dispute was caused mainly by the concerns about the future of Gagauz culture after the ruin of Soviet Union and the alleged neglect of Chisinau to Gagauz problems.
The political atmosphere in Gagauzia is pretty difficult to grasp although it is a small ethnic group. Gagauz nationalism flourished in 1980s was basically, intellectual movement. This movement strengthened when Moldova voiced wishes to reunite with Romania. The question is why so-called Gagauz nationalism was worried about “Romanization” policy of Moldovan nationalists, while having displayed more loyalty to Russia, the country which practically pursued terrible “russification” policy in Gagauzia. There can be quite different approaches: a) having suffered from “russification” policy Gagauz intellectuals was concerned about its replacement with the new wave of “romanization” movement; b) global changes in the world political map, including national liberation movements in other Turkish countries motivated Gagauz intellectuals to be concerned about the future of Gagauz people; c) neighbouring Transnistrian experience played a good inspiring role. The Gagauz nationality has positive (constructive) and challenging facets. The most prominent aspect of Gagauz nationalism is that it isn’t eager for any sort of separatist paradigm, rather reflects on the very considerable conception of “strong autonomy – strong republic”. The challenging moment of the Gagauz nationalism is the likelihood of abuse of those national values or ideas by certain groups for own purposes. For instance, two political “clans” in Gagauzia, presenting them as if they were fighting for the strong Gagauz autonomy, were in fact in conflict with each other.
It is already high time for Gagauz to solve their long-lasted problems. Surely, they need support to solve them as quickly as possible. While the first support should come from Chisinau, the second but the most important one should come from all Gagauz people. If they want strong autonomy having wide-ranging powers, they should drift away from fighting each other. The external assistance (Russian or Turkish) to Gagauzia is very appreciable moment, but it should keep Gagauz away from thinking about its determinative role in resolving internal problems.
[1] King, Charles: „The Moldovans“, Hoover Institution Press, 2000, p. 213
No comments:
Post a Comment