People block a road in the Nukus district. Image from video recording on the site Gazeta.uz
Around 70 residents of Shortanbay aul (village) in the Nukus district of Karakalpakstan (an autonomous republic within Uzbekistan) blocked a major road and set fire to tyres, demanding their settlement be connected to the natural gas grid. A video recording of their protest was posted on the internet on 27 November, writes Gazeta.uz (in Russian), citing state news agency UzA (details of the roadblock have since been removed from the agency’s website).
Citing representatives of the Nukus district’s hokimiyat (local administration), UzA reported that local authorities had established the identities of the organisers of the protest. They were said to be two residents of the Shortanbay aul, named in the news report by their initials.
The protest took place at the entrance to the Kirantay rural council premises, located 8.5km from Nukus. The settlement is included in a list of areas requiring alternative energy provision in wintertime, in the form of liquefied gas and coal. However, local residents refuse to buy coal on account of its low quality and demand that the village be supplied with natural gas.
District hokim A. Seytaxov and district prosecutor Sh. Allambergenov attended the site of the protest and 116 tons of coal were swiftly brought in and distributed to residents. Representative of the company Uztransgaz, Kh. Aymanov, and Karakalpakstan’s minister of interior affairs A. Temirkhanov also met with the protesters and explained to them “the reasons for the shortage of natural gas and the illegality of the protest”.
A working group was set up to look into the issue of energy provision to the village. Over 400 low-income families were each given 500 kilograms of coal, two bottles of gas and 10 log-carts of firewood free of charge. The authorities pledged that from 1 December, natural gas will be supplied to three local schools, a kindergarten and a local medical centre. Officials added that after work is completed to replace 16 kilometres of old pipes, it will be possible to connect the whole aul to the region’s gas network.
Gas provision in Uzbekistan remains an acute problem: many districts are still not connected to the natural gas network, and in urban areas provision suffers from frequent interruptions. In September of this year, the Ministry of Energy’s “Xududgazta’minot” organ set up an open Facebook group under the heading “Gas supply: problems and solutions”. Within 24 hours, tens of complaints were posted about gas provision, payment processes and costs.
