Political Dynasties II

Indonesia’s outgoing president Joko Widodo did not explicitly endorse election winner Prabowo Subianto. But Prabowo chose as his running mate Gibran Rakabuming Raka, the eldest son of the leader known as Jokowi. The 36-year-old Gibran was able to run after a ruling by a court headed by Jokowi’s brother-in-law found an exception to the minimum age requirement of 40. With another political dynasty in the making, the time is ripe to return to the theme that I first explored two years ago.

Questions

1) Another ASEAN member to begin with. In 2022 the daughter of the outgoing president successfully ran for vice president in an alliance with the winner of the presidential election (another dynast). At the time she was the mayor of a city and had succeeded her father in that role. This year the former president has turned into a bitter critic of the current leader, leaving the families’ alliance in tatters. Name the country and the vice president (despite the feud, she is still part of the government)

2) This billionaire-turned-politician was elected twice as prime minister only to be ousted by the military. His sister became the prime minister but was also removed in a coup. His daughter now heads the party associated with him. It’s now the governing party after striking a deal with military-linked parties, its longtime foes, after elections last year. He returned to his country from exile and started serving a sentence for corruption charges but was freed on parole. Who?

3) Etienne ———-was a loyalist of his country’s longtime dictator and served as a minister. By the 1980s he parted ways to form an opposition party defying repressive tactics. He was prime minister briefly during the 1990s. In 2011 he fell short in a disputed presidential vote, an outcome he did not recognise. He was back in the limelight as the incumbent delayed holding elections. But he died in Brussels in 2017 amid negotiations for a political transition. Elections were finally held in December 2018 and Felix ——, son of Etienne became president in the country’s first peaceful transfer of power since independence in 1960. Name the country and the current president, who was re-elected last December.

4) He became prime minister in 1956 after campaigning on a populist platform geared towards the majority ethnic group. He was assassinated by a Buddhist monk in 1959. His wife took over as party leader and was elected prime minister in 1960, becoming the first woman to be elected prime minister anywhere in the world. In the 1990s her daughter replaced her as party leader and the daughter was elected president (the country had shifted to the presidential system). She was back as prime minister with her daughter as president. Name the country and the family.

5) Emomali Rahmon has been president of his country from 1994. The football federation of this country, a surprise success story at the 2023 AFC Asian Cup, is headed by the president’s son. The son is also mayor of the capital city, chairman of the upper house of parliament and is widely expected to succeed his father. Earlier he was a striker and captained a football club. Which country?

6) In February she was sworn in as the first female provincial chief minister in her country. Her father is a three-time former prime minister while her uncle is the current PM. Who and which country?

7) This Asian country’s had only three prime ministers since independence in 1965. The first PM was in office until 1990. His son took charge in 2004. Last year he announced he would be stepping down before the next election, which must be held by November 2025. Which country?

8) He was elected president in 1990 and was impeached in November 2000, a day after he fled to Japan. He was arrested during a visit to Chile and extradited. He was imprisoned for human rights abuses but was released from jail last December. While president, he appointed his daughter as first lady while in her teens after publicly falling out with her mother. The daughter later became the leader of the conservative party associated with him and undertook three failed runs for president (2011, 2016 and 2021) only to be defeated in the runoff each time. Name the country and family.

9) Her father seized power in a coup in 1961 and ruled as a dictator until 1979 when he was assassinated. While in her early twenties, she took on the role of first lady in 1974 after an assassin’s bullet intended for her father killed her mother. She was elected president in 2013, the first woman in the role in her country. But she was impeached in 2017 and convicted on charges of corruption and abuse of power. Who and which country?

10) He was re-elected president with 92 percent support in February, just months after a decisive military victory (The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe said the election took place in a restrictive environment with no real political competition). He’s been president of his country since 2003 when his father died. His father was president of the former Soviet Republic from 1993 to 2003 during which time he initiated a major oil deal. Which country and family?

11) He led his country to independence in 1963 and became its first president. He remained in office until his death in 1978. One of his sons was named after the Swahili word for ‘freedom’. The son was eventually elected president for two terms from 2013 to 2022. Name the country and family.

12) Name the other father-son combination besides the Bushes to be elected president in the U.S.

13) Masoud Barzani was president of a regional government from 2005 to 2017, who resigned after a backlash against an independence referendum he organised. His nephew Nechirvan has been president since 2019 while his son Masrour became prime minister. Which autonomously administered region of a country?

14) Juan José Arévalo became his country’s first democratically elected president in 1944 after leading a mass movement that ousted a military dictatorship. Inspired by U.S. president Franklin D. Roosevelt’s ‘New Deal’, Arevalo initiated a series of progressive reforms focusing on labour rights, education, and healthcare. He handed over power in 1951 only to see a U.S.-backed military coup in 1954 and a long-drawn civil war. His son Bernardo Arévalo, a political outsider was the surprise winner in last year’s presidential election. The conservative attorney general unsuccessfully tried to prevent Arevalo from taking office. Which country? (Washington firmly backed Arevalo)

15) Ending with a political dynasty that fizzled. In 1950 one son of a successful former U.S. president was routed by a huge margin in his bid to be governor of California. Another son made it to the House of Representatives but faltered in his attempts to run for New York’s governor as well as attorney general. Name the former U.S. president.

If you want to look at whom to exclude, check out the answers to my previous quiz on the theme.