Tajik President Outlaws Slavic Endings on Names

[Harold F. Schiffman]

March 28, 2007

Tajik President Outlaws Slavic Endings on Names

By ILAN GREENBERG

ALMATY, Kazakhstan, March 27 Amid a series of idiosyncratic decrees aimed
at removing traces of Soviet influence, the president of Tajikistan
announced Tuesday that he had dropped the Slavic ov from the end of his
surname and that, henceforth, the same must be done for all babies born to
Tajik parents. Most Tajiks added a Slavic ending to their surnames when
the country came under Soviet rule early in the last century. The
president, Emomali Rakhmon (formerly Rakhmonov) also banned certain school
holidays and traditions associated with the Soviet period, including a
holiday known as ABC Book Day, when toddlers gather in a circle to read
aloud. He also ordered all university students to leave cellphones and
cars at home, saying they distracted from academic study.

Mr. Rakhmon won a third seven-year term in November in a presidential
election widely dismissed as a farce. But Tajikistan's political culture
has not produced the sort of ethnocentric governing style that developed
in nearby Turkmenistan, where Saparmurat Niyazov, the dictatorial leader
also known as Turkmenbashi (Leader of All Turkmens), died three months
ago. Central Asian governments have chosen vastly different approaches
toward their ethnically mixed populations, from the extreme ethnic
chauvinism prevailing in Turkmenistan to an officially enforced
celebration of multiculturalism in Kazakhstan, the region's economic giant
to the north.  But Tajik nationalism has not become a dominant political
force in the country, a report prepared for the Library of Congress says.

Tajiks reached by telephone in Dushanbe, the capital, said the president's
decrees had little popular support but had engendered confusion and mild
annoyance at the imposition. It doesn't matter to me to say the truth; I'm
not thinking about it, said Shamsiyna Ofaridyeza, 30, an accountant in
Dushanbe who is five months pregnant. But if the president says we have to
use Tajik names, then Ill change my baby's name. What else can I do? Ms.
Ofaridyeza and her husband have Tajik surnames made to sound more Russian.
Ms. Ofaridyeza was more supportive of the ban on students driving cars and
brandishing cellphones. Students are not studying, she said. They are too
busy sitting on their cars showing off. But you know, we are a democratic
people, and everyone should be able to name his baby what he wants.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/28/world/asia/28tajikistan.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

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