OPINION

By THÉRÈSE MARGOLIS

BAKU, Azerbaijan — On Wednesday, Feb. 7, the Caucasian nation of Azerbaijan held an early presidential election, and to the surprise of practically nobody, incumbent President Ilhan Aliyev won reelection for a fifth seven-year term by an overwhelming 92.05 percent.

Immediately following the announcement of the election results, Azerbaijan’s main international political detractors and some opposition leaders began to cry foul, accusing the Aliyev government of corrupt polling practices and a lack of “genuine pluralism.”

To “collaborate” their allegations of a dubious electoral validity and claims that the electoral process had been “restrictive,” these critics primarily pointed to Aliyev’s resounding victory, with the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) adding that “issues of secrecy of the vote, a lack of safeguards against multiple voting and indications of ballot stuffing raised serious questions about whether ballots were counted and reported honestly.”

But for those of us who actually witnessed the process, the transparency of the voting and the core reason for Aliyev’s unprecedented victory were obvious, and had nothing to do with either voter manipulation or polling irregularities.

In fact, the electoral process for Azerbaijan’s presidential elections were one of the most transparent globally, with every single eligible voter — including ethnic Armenian Azeris who had supported a three-decade-long illegal occupation of parts of the country’s integral territory — being registered and allowed to vote.

Transparency

Not only were there lists of 6.5 million registered voters (in a country of 10.5 million) at every corresponding voting stations, but at least one representative of each of the seven presidential candidates was on hand at each of the 6,700 polling stations to verify that the process was carried out openly and transparently.

Azerbaijanis living abroad were also allowed to vote through 49 polling stations in 47 countries.

There were more than 790 official international observers from 72 countries and international institutions, and 90,372 Azerbaijani observers, including representatives of 83 NGOs and national and international human rights watchdog groups.

“Basically, any Azerbaijani who wanted to serve as an observer was allowed to register,” explained Mazahir Panahov, chairman of Azerbaijan’s Central Election Commission (CEC), during a press conference on the eve of the election.

And because many Azeris chose to vote outside their corresponding voting precincts, at virtually every station, there were inspectors who verified each voter with an electronic fingerprint machine against a national database to ensure that there were no incidences of duplicate voting or use of falsified credentials.

All of the observers were allowed entry to their corresponding station prior to its opening, where they could inspect the sealed plastic voting urns that were in full view at all times, and remained on the premises until every single vote had been cast and counted.

Both observers and the media — national and international — were granted unprecedented access to all stations, except inside for the curtained voting booths where the voters filled in their ballots by hand.

Additionally, the Azerbaijani government installed webcams at more than 1,500 voting stations outside of the voting booths.

“These webcams covered the entire premises of the voting stations, enabling basically real livestreaming and monitoring, tracking of all of the proceedings happening on the premises of voting station, again, except outside of the voting booths, because voting booths are the only places at voting stations where web cameras did not have a livestream,” Panahov said.

The Candidates

In total, there were seven candidates in the running, five from political parties — including that of Aliyev — and two independents.

Representatives from Azerbaijan’s other nine political parties (which did not have candidates in this election) were also granted permission to serve as official observers of the electoral process.

Each candidate, regardless of the size of their constituency, was granted the same amount of free air time on Azerbaijani television and radio and full access to voters in open forums prior to the elections.

It is worth noting that not a single incidence of violence or physical confrontation took place at any of the 6,700 polling stations on Feb. 7 and the entire process was conducted in an orderly manner.

This is not to say, however, that the entire process was pulled off without a hitch.

There were, according to some observers, minor issues of concern linked to the polling.

According to some sources, just prior to the elections, the government allegedly exerted pressure on several media representatives, and a degree of political dissent was suppressed, although evidence of these claims was vague and unverified.

Still, given the efforts made by the Aliyev administration and the autonomous Central Election Commission, the Azerbaijani election process was among the most open and transparent worldwide.

Why the Landslide Victory?

If the elections were as fair and open as claimed, how is it possible that Ilhan Aliyev won by such a massive margin?

The answer is simple: Sovereignty and economics.

For nearly 30 years, a full 20 percent of Azerbaijan’s internationally recognized territory known as Karabakh was flagrantly occupied illegally by Armenian troops.

Despite four United National Security Council resolutions in 1993, a UN General Assembly resolution in 2008, and countless deadlocked brokering attempts by foreign entities, Armenia simply refused to budge, meanwhile leveling more than 642,000 acres of protected forests to strip mine the region in one of the most devastating examples of ecocide in modern global history.

Not only did the Armenians destroy the homes, schools and religious centers of the region in order to have unlawful access to the minerals and ensure that the more than 700,000 displaced native Azerbaijanis and their families would have no place to which to return, but they tellingly never bothered to construct any significant permanent structures of their own, in effect acknowledging that they were only there to exploit Karabakh until they were forced to comply with international law.

Finally, in late 2020, the Azerbaijani government took military action against the Armenians, reclaiming most of Karabakh, and later in 2023, reclaiming the remaining sections, at last liberating the entire occupied territories.

The mastermind behind the military counteroffensive against the Armenian troops was Ilham Aliyev.

Because the issue of national sovereignty and territorial integrity were core issues for nearly every Azerbaijani citizen, the president was understandably hailed as a national hero, adding to his already strong popularity nationwide.

Moreover, since the liberation of the occupied territories three years ago, the Aliyev government has invested more than $6 billion in rebuilding homes, schools, hospitals and transportation infrastructure in Karabakh.

All Azeris who were displaced by Armenian troops in the 1980s and their descendants have been offered free homes in the reconstructed areas, and new communities and towns are being reconstructed.

It’s the Economy…

Economics has always been a motivating factor in democratic elections, and Azerbaijan is no exception.

Although blessed with abundant natural gas and petroleum resources (which currently make up about two-thirds of the country’s GDP), Azerbaijan was considered an impoverished region during the Soviet era.

But under the strategic economic programs set up by Ilham Aliyev, and his predecessor and father Heydar Aliyev, the country has now become a regional economic powerhouse.

In the last decade, Azerbaijan Azerbaijan experienced a “golden age” during which the average growth rate reached record high levels and poverty decreased significantly.

On average, the economy grew by 15.3 percent per annum in real terms during this period, mainly driven by the oil sector (21.5 percent growth per year), but also with a significant contribution from the non-oil sector (11.1 percent per year).

As a result, poverty declined dramatically from 49.6 percent in 2001 to 4.3 percent today.

In other words, most Azeris now are better off than they were two decades ago, and they accredit that improvement in their lifestyles and finances to Aliyev.

When an economy is strong and people feel that they are benefiting from the current government policies, they tend to vote for incumbent candidates, be it in Azerbaijan or in any other country.

Why the Early Elections? 

One of the main criticisms presented against the Feb. 7 elections was that they were preemptive.

Originally slated for October 2025, the government moved them up a full 20 months.

The reasoning behind the early polling is somewhat ambiguous, but the general response from Panahov and most government officials was that it was a “historic vote” since it was the first time in Azerbaijan’s recent history that the balloting could be freely held nationwide, including in the recently liberated territories.

With the liberation of Karabakh under his belt, the timing of the vote undoubtedly represented a poll boost for the sitting president (although he didn’t seem to need it, given that in the last presidential election, in April 2018, he won with an 83.5-percent majority).

But according to Farid Shafiyev, chairman of the independent thinktank Center of Analysis of International Relations, the real answer is twofold.

“Yes, this election was first of all about jurisdiction. It was about the historical fact that we were going to have elections over the whole territory,” he told Pulse News Mexico.

“And it also symbolically marked the end of the conflict with Armenia and opened up a way for a truly profound internal domestic transformation of Azerbaijan.”

But Shafiyev said that the elections were also intended to reaffirm the political stability of Azerbaijan given the current complex geopolitical situation around the south Caucasus area.

“In the north we have the Russian-Ukrainian war, in the south we have the conflict in the Middle East around Gaza, around Iran. But Azerbaijan is stable, domestically stable. And that’s the one important achievements,” he said.

Shafiyev also said that by “bringing an end to the chapter of conflict with Armenia,” the election opened the door for the establishment of a formal peace agreement with Yerevan.

“I am quite convinced that treaty is doable, perhaps even this year,” he said.

“In the end, much will depend on the Armenian side.”

Shafiyev said that the biggest obstacles to that treaty are “radical elements in the Armenian diaspora, and some geopolitical players like France.”

“They unfortunately meddling into this situation, not in a constructive way, trying to ignite, again, animosity and supporting one side against another is not the strategy which will bring peace to the south Caucuses,” he said.

Shafiyev went on to say that there is still as very powerful Armenian lobby in the United States and parts of Europe that is trying to mispresent the expulsion of the Armenian occupation of Azerbaijan as act of aggression by Baku.

By turning the page on the Karabakh conflict with the elections, Shafiyev said that now Azerbaijanis — and hopefully, Armenians — can move past their hostilities and begin to build peace, a much-needed element in the region and the world.