TASHKENT

Uzbekistan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party ( UzLiDeP ) has nominated President Shavkat Mirziyoyev for the country’s October 24 presidential election. He is widely expected to run and secure a second term as head of the populous Central Asian nation.

President Mirziyoyev has not responded to UzliDep’s decision yet. Still, the country’s prime minister Abdulla Aripov, a member of the party’s political council, hailed the president for bracing himself and implementing ambitious reforms that the country has seen in recent years.

“We take large-scale reforms on the path of the prosperity of our motherland, the well-being of our people for granted as if they are happening on their own. In fact, all this is based on the determination of a person who is capable of solving urgent problems facing our state, selfless, courageous, strong and wise – the respected Shavkat Miromonovich Mirziyoyev,” he said.

The resource-rich Central Asian nation of 34 million had been led by Mirziyoyev, who took over in late 2016 following the death of veteran leader Islam Karimov, who had run Uzbekistan with an iron fist for 27 years.

Since 2016, Mirziyoyev unveiled an ambitious economic reform program, opened up the country to foreign trade and investment, scrapped monetary and other administrative burdens for business eased restrictions on religious and media freedoms.

“What was the state of the currency market five years ago? Many, many ‘smart’ people … strongly opposed the liberalisation of the foreign exchange market. Only thanks to the determination of the respected Shavkat Miromonovich the foreign exchange market became free,” the prime minister said.

Three other political parties and one ecological party, represented in the parliament, have also nominated presidential candidates. Except one, all other candidates are not widely known to the public.

Alisher Kadirov, 46, a leader of the Milliy Tiklanish (National Revival) party and a vice-speaker of the parliament, has become widely known for his resonant statements about Uzbek migrant workers in Russia, the influence of the Russian language, the most sensitive LGBT issue and many others.

He once proposed to strip off citizenship and evict the members of the LGBT society from the country, saying the Uzbek mentality will never accept it. Same-sex relation is a crime in Uzbekistan.

“Uzbekistan has renewed itself, and there will be new elections in Uzbekistan…we believe that the elections in the new Uzbekistan will be completely free and fair,” Kadirov said.

Another candidate, Bahrom Abdukhalimov, 62, Adolat (Justice) party leader, is a doctor of historical sciences and professor but little known to the wide public.

Some local experts said that the candidacy of Maksuda Vorisova, a deputy head of the People’s Democratic Party (NDPU), was approved as a presidential candidate barely to stick to gender equality.

However, Varisova , 60, a former doctor, told local media that she was chosen as a candidate not because she is a woman, but because she is “an ordinary mother, an ordinary woman who knows about the people’s problems from within. ”

And the fifth candidate is Narzullo Oblomurodov, 46, leader of the ecological party. Graduated from the Uzbek University of World Economy and Diplomacy and the University of Birmingham (UK), he had worked at the state nature protection committee before coming to the parliament.

All candidates have never criticized the incumbent president and his reform program.

Uzbekistan’s Central Election Commission said earlier that it had sent formal invitations to the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) and the Parliamentary Assembly of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe to observe Uzbek presidential elections in October.