Uzbekistan votes for amendments to Constitution

The Central Election Commission (CEC) of Uzbekistan has announced the preliminary results of the referendum on amendments to the national constitution. The authorities said that 90.21% of those who took part in the referendum have said yes to amendments and 9.35% said no.

More than 16.6 million Uzbekistanis out of 19.7 million people eligible for the referendum have come to voting stations in absolute figures (84.54%), the CEC reported.

According to Bakhrom Kuchkarov, deputy head of the commission, although there might have been some areas for improvement, there were no significant violations that would have had an impact on the results of the referendum.

On April 30, Uzbekistanis were supposed to take part in the nationwide referendum on amendments to the constitution. They should have responded to the only question: do you accept the Constitutional law about the constitution of the Republic of Uzbekistan? Yes or No.

The new version of the country’s main law is going to be renewed to the extent of 65% and the number of its articles will increase from 128 to 155. The key amendment to the Constitution is the extension of a president’s term of service from five to seven years. Moreover, the document resets Shavkat Mirziyoyev’s previous presidential terms which will allow him to run for two more seven-year presidential terms.

Among other major amendments are decreasing the number of senators from 100 to 65, prohibiting of the death penalty and banning Uzbek citizens from being extradited to foreign countries.

The current constitution of Uzbekistan was adopted in 1992. Since then the country’s authorities amended the main law on 15 occasions.