Azerbaijan, Baku, 8 September/ Trend , corr I. Alizade, J. Babayeva/ Elshan Manafov, member and secretary of the Central Committee of the opposition left wing Social Democratic Party of Azerbaijan says his dismissal is the gross violation of party's regulations.
"According to the regulations, any member of the party can criticize activities of the party's bodies. Recently, the party has been experiencing crisis and I saw the way out in carrying out staff reforms as a lot of hard work was put to set up this party," Manafov said to Trend .
SDPA is a lefty wing opposition party. The co-chairman of the party is Araz Alizade and the other co-chairman is Ayaz Mutallibov, former president who lives in immigration at present. Ayaz Mutallibov was elected first president in 1991 when Azerbaijan gained independence. Later an action was brought against him. He has been living in immigration in Russia since 1992.
SDPA held the meeting of the Central Committee on 6 September. The problems of the party were discussed during the meeting. Manafov, close friends with Mutallibov, who accused Alizade of not being able to run the party, was dismissed.
Manaof said he was dismissed from the party as he was allegedly opposing the political line of the party. "At the meeting, Rana Javadova, the right-hand-man of Alizade and deputy chairman of the party accused me of insulting Alizade as planned before. I said it is obvious that Alizade deviates from the main political line of the party. They do not want to differentiate between insult and criticism," he said.
He said there are disagreements among SDPA co-chairmen regarding the position on the presidential elections. The former secretary said Alizade's position in this issue was the serious breach of party's regulation.
"Because, this issue had to be brought up into the discussion of the Central Committee if the co-chairmen had not reach agreement. Alizade introduced the decision adopted only by him to the Central Committee. On the other hand, the meetings of the Bureau were not held and meetings of the Central Committee were always rich in violation of regulations. There were not any relations with the local organizations. There were no any financial resources for the upkeep of the party. When I indicated all these issues to him, he just ignored," Manafov added.
Manafov said therefore he told media about problems and authoritarianism trends within the party, but Alizade described it as an insult.
"The key factor is that Alizade was afraid to take part in the same conference with me. A split can take place in a conference. He dismissed me to prevent me from taking part in the conference. The supporters of Mutallibov did not attend the meeting. The other co-chairman Araz Mutallibov opposed my dismissal by telephone," Manafov said.
The correspondent can be contacted at : [email protected]