Leadership of the People’s Democratic Party of Uzbekistan tells about the pre-election program, plans to ensure decent living conditions for people, reforming the child protection system, ratification of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, choosing a candidate for the post of prime minister and introducing the election of khokims.

On the eve of December elections of deputies of the Legislative Chamber of the Oliy Majlis, Gazeta.uz spoke with the leaders of the People’s Democratic Party of Uzbekistan. The questions were answered by the Chairman of the Central Council of the party Ulugbek Inoyatov, Deputy Chairman, member of the Senate Maksuda Varisova, as well as the Chief Advisor to the Chairman Mikhail Yelshov. The party’s pre-election program can be found on its website.

— Who is your electorate?

Ulugbek Inoyatov: Our party protects vulnerable segments of the population, which includes retirees by age, who, according to the State Statistics Committee for 2019, are 2.7 million in the country, people with disabilities – 377 thousand, pensioners who have lost the breadwinner – 177 thousand, recipients of social benefits – 345 thousand.

There is an able-bodied population, but not working at a permanent place. These are 1.7 million people engaged in seasonal activities and 2.5 million migrants. Total non-working people account for 5.4 million people. These are those population groups whose interests are defended by our party.

A country will develop when there will be competition between parties. Therefore, UzLiDeP (Liberal Democratic Party of Uzbekistan) requires that entrepreneurs have more rights. And we say that since entrepreneurs employ workers, let them pay workers decent wages and create normal working conditions.

Thus, our ideology does not always intersect with the ideology of other parties. Our corps in local councils occupies the first or second place in terms of number so far. Because our ideology is closer to people. At the local level, the social sphere [concerns people] more.

And on a national scale, interest in economic development prevails. The more developed the economy, the more the social sphere will develop. People also understand this. Without economics, we cannot talk about social development.

— According to world statistics, people with disabilities make up 10% of the total population of the country. In our country this figure is almost 10 times less than in other countries. Could this be related to the difficulty of confirming disability?

Mikhail Yelshov: Socially vulnerable segments of the population are divided into able-bodied and disabled. The first category includes people who do not have a permanent job, a solid income.

In the category of people with disabilities there are those who need outside care and are recipients of disability pensions, which is the only and main source of livelihood. There are 377 thousand such people.

But these are only those who receive pensions and benefits. In addition, there are people with disabilities who receive disability benefits and work at the same time. True, 3 percent quotas on employment of people with disabilities are not respected.

There are still people with disabilities since childhood. Only not all of them are recipients of disability pensions. The third group does not receive pension. There are retirees by age who already in retirement age acquire disability. Of course, he does not receive a disability pension. That is, the number of people with disabilities is approaching 10%. Here the margin is very fuzzy.

— The People’s Democratic Party of Uzbekistan stated that if it wins the election, it will nominate Achilbay Ramatov as Prime Minister. Whose initiative is this?

Ulugbek Inoyatov: The majority out of the 500 thousand members of our party are people with great practical experience, whom the people know as leaders and good managers. In this regard, we can boast.

Chairman of the Senate Tanzila Narbayeva, Minister of Economy Botir Khojayev and Minister of Public Education Sherzod Shermatov are members of our party, First Deputy Prime Minister Achilbay Ramatov, hero of Uzbekistan is member of the Executive Committee of the Central Council.

When we were asked whom we were considering as Prime Minister, we said that we were seeing Ramatov. He deserves it. Moreover, in government, he shows himself well. He implements programs and, in general, during the years of independence, he did a lot for Uzbekistan.

— The People’s Democratic Party of Uzbekistan is actively attracting youth to its youth wing “Istiqbol”. Would you tell us more about it?

Maksuda Varisova: Of the total party composition, 37% are people under 30... If you compare the data of the Central Election Commission, our party is the youngest [in composition] of candidates for deputies.

This wing is necessary because elections are held primarily for young people. We are making a plan for the next five years... What kind of work the youth will have, salary, what kind of transport, which kindergarten you will send your children to. This is all planned based on the election. Therefore, the elections are for young people. Therefore, we attract young people to be saturated with our ideas.

Ulugbek Inoyatov: Of all our candidates, 48% are women, 38% are young people. Our program focuses more on women, youth, and large families. In addition, we give specifics for which the voter can cling to.

For example, so that all six-year-olds went to kindergarten, so that there were nursery groups. To exempt large families from paying courses. Due to lack of money in their parents, these children are sitting at home. Social equality lies precisely in the fact that vulnerable people should not suffer.

Maksuda Varisova: Previously, maternity leave was included in the work experience, but now only three years are included. Raising a child is a hard work. Therefore, we are trying to ensure that the period that a woman spends with a child is counted in the working experience.

— Statements are often heard that the post of khokims should be elected. Will your party promote this?

Maksuda Varisova: The President talks a lot about this in each message to the parliament. Nevertheless, for this it is necessary that our people were ready to elect...

Khokim is an important person, a very responsible post. Therefore, we must first determine the criteria for khokims. Khokims must be good economists, sociologists, psychologists in order to understand the development of both medicine and enlightenment. That is, they should be aware of all aspects. It is very hard…

Now khokims have a lot of responsibility. They are responsible for healthcare, roads, and schools. Moreover, it should be so that each ministry is responsible for its field of activity throughout the country. That the khokim controlled precisely the social aspect of life.

We are not ready for this yet. Therefore, they are appointed now. In addition, we still do not have specially trained personnel for the khokimiyat. The President is working on it now, so that the khokim was prepared on all issues. Therefore, we are for the election of khokims, but so far, there is no system.

Mikhail Yelshov: It is important to be able to properly distribute work between subordinates. Today, this is not enough for many khokims. There are deputies, heads of agencies and departments. Everyone should be engaged in his or her own plots. Moreover, the khokim should coordinate all this.

Why we are not ready today – far from everything today is clearly resolved in those issues on which resolutions, presidential decrees and laws have already been adopted. A lot is slipping. The President has repeatedly spoken about this, repeatedly raised the issue. Including criticized the party for the fact that we do not control the activities of the local executive power through our party groups of councils of people’s deputies.

In fact, the khokim is now receiving immunity status for five years. It is more difficult to replace it with another if he turns out to be an unworthy person. In this case, the election of khokims, when the personnel is not yet ready, will lead to a “leapfrog” of useless local elections.

Therefore, here we must first make sure that the governor’s corps has formed. In order to lead the region and purposefully manage the region, the khokim, first of all, must know well what is being done below. At least he must pass a district or city khokim step.

Besides this, he must clearly know what is being done upstairs. That is, before moving from the district to the khokimiyat [of the region], he must work for some time in the republican bodies...

Here, the whole system of training, the formation of the personnel corps should be ready for us to move on to the election of khokims. In any case, practice shows that election is better. Because then the khokim becomes responsible directly to the people. This is consistent with the constitutional principle, which states that power in the country belongs to people, which are the only source of state power.

In addition, it is necessary that the law provides for the procedure for recalling khokims. And not as it was, that we elected deputies, but only now the right to recall deputies who do not suit us has appeared.

— In 2005, in response to the union of factions of UzLiDeP, Fidokorlar and Adolat in the Legislative Chamber into the Democratic Bloc, the faction of the People’s Democratic Party of Uzbekistan declared that it was taking on the role of the opposition parliamentary minority. What was your opposition manifested in? What issues did you oppose the parliamentary majority?

Mikhail Yelshov: Most likely, the People’s Democratic Party of Uzbekistan has lost its place because traditionally it is identified with the party from which the Head of the state is running that this party is leading. Therefore, since 2005, UzLiDeP has pulled the largest number of seats in the Legislative Chamber.

As for the opposition, yes, we made such a statement in 2005, but there was no legislative basis for this. In 2007, a constitutional law was passed, which stipulated that a faction could declare itself opposition if it did not share the program of upcoming government activities.

After the 2014 elections, the People’s Democratic Party of Uzbekistan declared that it was in opposition to the parliamentary majority, made up of UzLiDeP and Milliy Tiklanish factions, because it has its own vision of how to solve the social and economic problems that the country faces. In addition, in the corresponding statement published in the press, it was clearly shown in what exactly the party has its point of view.

Despite the fact that the parties UzLiDeP and Milliy Tiklanish joined the parliamentary majority, they did not express their attitude to the government’s program of activity, nor endorsing this program and stating that they fully support it and strive for the government to realize their program, not vice versa.

For all the time, for the entire period, these two factions gathered together no more than five to six times and on non-essential issues that were not of fundamental importance from the point of view of the reforms being implemented.

Therefore, I would ask a question from UzLiDeP and Milliy Tiklanish: “Why didn’t it work?” It probably did not work because, first of all, we were not in the majority. Nevertheless, if to look at the practical results, we can talk about the following.

First, a guaranteed right to a first job for graduates appeared in the Labor Code. Second, on the proposal of the People’s Democratic Party of Uzbekistan, working pensioners were given the right to receive a full pension without any withdrawal. Third, we drew attention to problems of persons with disabilities and achieved much of what is provided for by the standard rules for ensuring equal opportunities in the law on social protection of persons with disabilities.

The initiative of the faction was manifested in consideration and adoption of amendments to the law on psychiatric care of the population, which was done on the basis of an appropriate survey of the practical application of this law.

There are many other examples. However, for the most part, much has been done locally. Since 2005, the party has been working with public receptions, where people apply. They appeal directly to party organizations, to deputies elected from the People’s Democratic Party of Uzbekistan to the district, city and regional councils. In 80% of cases and more appeals find their practical solution. People are satisfied with addressing these issues.

Of course, we do not compete with the President’s reception offices. The state office works there. Nevertheless, many of the issues that people come to us with, they no longer go to public reception offices with these problems. They get solutions from us.

Will we be in opposition? None of the parties, entering the election campaign, knowingly takes on the role of the future political opposition. This is nonsense. Each party goes to the polls in order to win them.

We will win – we will form the parliamentary majority. On our own or with someone else. If we do not win, it means we will watch, either we take a neutral, expecting position, or, most likely, we will be opposition to the party that will be in the majority.

Ulugbek Inoyatov: We are getting ready, we will make all our efforts in order to get the majority of places. Naturally, we are not leading. Maybe we will not get the majority.

However, in the early years of the country’s independence, we were the strongest with our ideology. Then the market economy started, people more or less improved, and thus the ideology of a market economy naturally attracted people. We thus became secondary.

The opinion polls that are currently being conducted show that we are on average in second place in popularity.

— What is the difference between your 2019 program and the 2014 program?

Ulugbek Inoyatov: The 2019 program has more specificity. Now the program is more combined with the development program of Uzbekistan. That program was abstract and more theoretical. We are talking about how to specifically implement reforms in preschool education, public education, healthcare, and economic development.

Speaking about the 2019 program, we believe that public services, food and non-food products should be available to people. Until today, Uzbekistan has not adopted a law on a living wage, on a consumer basket.

Consumer basket consists of food and non-food parts and services. We have about 45 products in our consumer basket that a person should consume in order not to get sick. A set of products has been compiled together with institutes, health food physicians, specialists and economists.

In other countries, more or less products are included in the consumer basket. It depends on the economic condition of the state. We calculated the amount of the consumer basket based on market conditions.

The cost of the minimum necessary services and non-food products is added to the sum of food products.

Salaries, pensions and benefits should come from a living wage. For a person to live with dignity, he must receive a decent pension, salary, scholarship or allowance. It all comes from the amount of the consumer basket.

In Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and European countries, the minimum wage is about 1.2-1.3 of the cost of living. It should not be less.

We are promoting the determination of the subsistence level so that socially vulnerable segments of the population receive decent benefits or wages and can eat and live normally.

If we approve the living wage by law, we will have specific criteria: who lives below the living wage, who needs to be given the allowance, who is poor. Many say that they have a low-income family, children. Then it is necessary to calculate everything. For this, real incomes need to be calculated. Therefore, this law is needed. This is the biggest issue in the economic part of our program.

Other areas of our pre-election program are affordable housing, utilities, jobs, equal education rights, and healthcare services so that low-income families have free high-tech diagnostics at least once a year.

We propose ratifying the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. Then everything in our country will have to comply with the international standard rules for creating equal opportunities for people with disabilities.

These standards have already been introduced into the legislation on urban planning, but we do not comply with them. In some places, we have not created conditions for people with disabilities. They cannot use transport, go down the subway, or enter a store or pharmacy. We need to create life for them without obstacles.

In addition, children who are brought up in the houses of Mekhribonlik should be brought up in family conditions. Children who are brought up in institutional agencies are hard to adapt to an independent life. They must have foster parents, they must integrate into society. And we isolate them. This is not good.

Therefore, we propose modifying Mekhribonlik houses. So that children lived 5-6 people in one cottage, so that they had a mother, brothers, sisters, and they could learn how to live.

I worked in the public education system (Ulugbek Inoyatov was the Minister of Public Education in 2013-2018 – ed.) and I passed through the problem of orphanages. We started the deinstitutionalization program at the Ministry of Public Education, but it is still not being implemented. SOS Children’s Villages has only three settlements in the country. The rest of Mekhribonlik houses work according to the Soviet standard. Therefore, the adoption of the program must be accelerated. I think that children should be given to foster care.

People should feel themselves included in society in Sakhovat nursing homes and for disabled people in Muruvvat.

Not all this can be hung on the state. We need to attract social partners, our population is becoming more wealthy. There are people who can invest their savings in support of those in need. For charity, it is also necessary to create conditions so that people can participate in the reform of these institutions on the basis of public-private partnership.

— The party suggests legislatively determining the criteria for establishing tuition fees in non-governmental education institutions created based on PPPs to prevent their transformation into privileged education institutions. Is this contrary to business freedom and choice?

Mikhail Yelshov: We are not going to put any barriers in front of private preschool education institutions and private schools. However, let us not forget that there are state education standards within which everyone has a constitutionally fixed right to receive relevant knowledge and skills without incurring any expenses on their part. We are thinking about the need for establishing some upper limit on the cost of standard preschool and secondary education.

At the same time, everything that a non-governmental education institution provides above these standards can be freely implemented on the educational market. It is only important that receiving an additional component in a non-governmental education institution did not become a service that could not be refused.

Our party, raising this issue, also believes that the non-state education sector should be transparent and subject to public control. Refer to the experiences of countries such as the United States and the United Kingdom, where a board of trustees manages its affairs in each private school. We welcome the formation of such public organizations in our private education institutions.

— In the program, you say that the supreme goal of the party is formation of a social democratic state. In democracies, it is customary to openly publish the costs of ministries, agencies and departments. Will the party achieve this?

Mikhail Yelshov: In Uzbekistan, following the results of a legal experiment in 2014, the law “On the openness of activities of the state governing bodies and administration” was adopted, which already provides for all of the above. Another issue is how it is performed.

Therefore, our party intends to strengthen parliamentary and deputy control over the implementation of this and other legislative acts aimed at ensuring transparency in the activities of state bodies (for example, anti-corruption laws, public control and others), to ensure their unconditional implementation.

Secondly, we intend to take the initiative to legislatively consolidate the mechanism of obligatory public consultations, public discussion and public examination of draft normative-legal acts affecting the social well-being of the population.

On this basis, the party intends to ensure that not a single law, not a single decision of state bodies that significantly change the order and level of targeted social protection of vulnerable segments of the population is adopted without obtaining appropriate public consent.

— Do you have a plan to increase the coverage of higher education? What percentage of applicants will be able to enter universities by the beginning of the next election?

Mikhail Yelshov: In general, our party supports the target parameters of the Concept for Development of the Higher Education System of the Republic of Uzbekistan until 2030, approved by the President of the country. This concept, as is known, provides for bringing higher education coverage to more than 50%.

However, for us the main thing in this matter is to ensure the accessibility of higher education for students from low-income families and other vulnerable groups of the population. We intend to seek to optimize the cost of educational contracts and provide all students in need with these comfortable living conditions in hostels. In addition, we believe that the amount of the scholarship should depend on the students’ academic performance and their participation in innovative activities.