Inomjon Usmonxo‘jayev

Inomjon Buzrukovich Usmonxo‘jayev (in Cyrillic Uzbek: Иномжон Бузрукович Усмонхўжаев ; in Russian: Инамджан Бузрукович Усманходжаев Inamdzhan Buzrukovich Usmankhodzhayev; 21 May 1930 – 17 March 2017) served as the eleventh First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Uzbek SSR. Usmonxo‘jayev became General Secretary following the disastrous "Cotton Scandal".

The Cotton Scandal
Usmonxo‘jayev succeeded Sharof Rashidov, who had been General Secretary since the 1950s. As orders from Moscow to grow more and more cotton spiraled in, the Uzbek government had respond by reporting miraculous growth in land irrigated and harvested, and record improvements in production and efficiency. Today it would seem that most of these records were falsified. Falsification of the results involved many officials in both Central Soviet Government in Moscow and Uzbekistan.

In 1986, it was announced that almost the entire party and government leadership of the republic had conspired in falsifying cotton production figures. A massive purge (only one minister survived the purge) of the Uzbek leadership was carried out, with prosecutors brought in from Moscow, leading to widespread arrests, executions, and suicides. It may never be known how high the corruption extended, as Leonid Brezhnev’s own son-in-law, Yuri Churbanov was implicated in the affair.

Usmonxo‘jayev's term
It was while Usmonxo‘jayev was General Secretary that satellite images showed that the Uzbek government's reports were false. Usmonxo‘jayev held his position throughout the scandal, serving as a puppet of Moscow as the Central Committee tried to strengthen its grip in Uzbekistan. Usmonxo‘jayev was General Secretary from 3 November 1983 until 12 January 1988. His replacement was Rafiq Nishonov. He died on 17 March 2017 at the age of 86.