Story By: Anna Guran, Sub-Editor: Joseph Golder, Agency: Central European News
Video Credit: CEN/kun.uz
This is the moment a governor is set on fire and left with 40 percent burns on his body after turning up unexpectedly in a digger to demolish a local businessmen’s new shop.
The incident happened in the Yakkabog District of the Qashqadaryo Region in Uzbekistan when local businessman and entrepreneur Bahriddin Isomov was shocked to see the local authority president, Hokim Mansur Tuymayev, turning up with a wrecking crew that included a mechanical digger and announcing plans to demolish his newly built shop because of supposed planning breaches.
In Uzbekistan, the Hokims are appointed by the president himself and are the highest authority in an area – effectively, they are regional governors – so that they can use those powers to tackle corruption at every level, even though they are sometimes found to be involved in the corruption themselves.
A huge argument between the Hokim and the businessmen then started when he turned up with the demolition team, with a large crowd quickly gathering, and the argument then culminated into tragedy when the official climbed into the digger himself, and announced he was going ahead with the demolition plans anyway.
The panicked businessmen, who said his family and other people were still in the property, then allegedly threw petrol over the official who was quickly engulfed in flames together with the cab of the digger.
He leapt out of the digger in flames, and people can be seen standing around doing nothing to help as he suffers 40 percent burns for which he was later hospitalised in critical condition. He reportedly died of his injuries.
It was not revealed whether the petrol was ignited deliberately or by accident from the vehicle exhaust or an electrical spark.
Police arrived together with an ambulance and arrested the businessmen, who was also burned in the incident.
According to the press service of the General Prosecutor’s Office, a criminal case was initiated against Bahriddin Isomov under articles 25 (preparation for a crime and attempted crime) and 97 (premeditated murder) of the Criminal Code of the Republic of Uzbekistan.
A spokesperson confirmed that the investigation was continuing, and the man’s son who was not named told local media that as well as people being inside the building, the demolition was illegal because they had not been notified of the plans.
They said that in fact, the notification of demolition had turned up a day after the incident and was therefore illegal in the first place.
Local council officials have declined to comment.
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