2003 Azerbaijani presidential election

Last updated February 05, 2024

Presidential elections were held in Azerbaijan on 15 October 2003. As expected, Ilham Aliyev, son of the outgoing president, Heydar Aliyev, was officially elected with an overwhelming majority in a vote international observers deemed to be not to be free or fair.^[1]^[2]

The election was characterized by ballot stuffing and manipulated voter lists. The final vote tabulation was kept from OSCE/ODIHR monitors, which meant that they could not judge the accuracy of the results.^[3] Police arrested members of electoral commissions who refused to sign paperwork on vote counts from their precincts.^[3] The opposition claimed that Gambar had won the election.^[3] The opposition protested against the election results, with the Aliyev regime arresting hundreds, including Gambar.^[4]

Conduct

Human Rights Watch stated that the "election campaign... from the beginning was heavily manipulated by the government to favor Prime Minister Ilham Aliyev, son of President Heydar Aliyev. The government ensured that election commissions would be stacked to favor Aliyev, and banned nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) from monitoring the vote. As the election drew nearer, government officials openly sided with Ilham Aliyev, obstructed opposition rallies, and sought to limit participation in them. Police have beaten and arbitrarily detained hundreds of opposition activists, including a 73-year-old woman."^[1]

The Institute for Democracy in Eastern Europe provided 188 election observers. The mission, requested by the United States government, formed part of a larger group of observers monitoring under the auspices of the OSCE. The IDEE observers observed more than 1,000 voting precincts and Constituency Election Centers where votes were tabulated, and collectively issued a "Votum Separatum," which expressed their outrage at election fraud, intimidation and political repression they witnessed during their observation mission and their disagreement with the OSCE's mild preliminary report calling the elections "generally well administered."^[2]

Results


Candidate		Party	Votes	%
	Ilham Aliyev	New Azerbaijan Party	1,860,346	75.38
	Isa Gambar	Musavat	372,385	15.09
	Lala Shevket	National Unity	100,558	4.07
	Etibar Mammadov	Azerbaijan National Independence Party	62,401	2.53
	İlyas İsmayılov	Justice Party	24,926	1.01
	Sabir Rustamkhanli	Civic Solidarity Party	23,730	0.96
	Qüdrat Hasanquliyev	Azerbaijani Popular Front Party	13,624	0.55
	Hafiz Hajiyev	Modern Equality Party	9,990	0.40
Total			2,467,960	100.00

Valid votes			2,467,960	88.39
Invalid/blank votes			324,037	11.61
Total votes			2,791,997	100.00
Registered voters/turnout			4,442,338	62.85
Source: IFES

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References

1 2 "Azerbaijan: Presidential Elections 2003 – Human Rights Watch Briefing Paper" (PDF). Human Rights Watch . 2003-10-13. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2020-09-23. Retrieved 2020-10-21.
1 2 "The Azerbaijan 'Elections' – October 15, 2003". Institute for Democracy in Eastern Europe . 2020-10-21. Archived from the original on 2020-09-04. Retrieved 2020-10-21.
1 2 3 Altstadt, Audrey L. (2017). Frustrated Democracy in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan. Columbia University Press. p. 77. doi:10.7312/alts70456. ISBN 978-0-231-70456-4.
↑ Hale, Henry E. (2014). Patronal Politics: Eurasian Regime Dynamics in Comparative Perspective. Cambridge University Press. p. 294. doi:10.1017/cbo9781139683524. ISBN 978-1-107-07351-7.

External links

OSCE report

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[HRW_AZ_pres_elec2003_full_pdf-1] 1 2 "Azerbaijan: Presidential Elections 2003 – Human Rights Watch Briefing Paper" (PDF). Human Rights Watch . 2003-10-13. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2020-09-23. Retrieved 2020-10-21.

[IDEE_AZ_preselec2003-2] 1 2 "The Azerbaijan 'Elections' – October 15, 2003". Institute for Democracy in Eastern Europe . 2020-10-21. Archived from the original on 2020-09-04. Retrieved 2020-10-21.

[:0-3] 1 2 3 Altstadt, Audrey L. (2017). Frustrated Democracy in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan. Columbia University Press. p. 77. doi:10.7312/alts70456. ISBN 978-0-231-70456-4.

[4] Hale, Henry E. (2014). Patronal Politics: Eurasian Regime Dynamics in Comparative Perspective. Cambridge University Press. p. 294. doi:10.1017/cbo9781139683524. ISBN 978-1-107-07351-7.

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v t e Elections and referendums in Azerbaijan
Presidential elections	1991 1992 1993 1998 2003 2008 2013 2018 2024
Parliamentary elections	1938 1947 1951 1955 1959 1963 1967 1971 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995–96 2000–01 2005 2010 2015 2020
Municipal elections	2009 2011 2014 2019
Referendums	1991 1993 1995 2002 2009 2016
See also: Elections and referendums in the Soviet Union