The policies of demokratizatsiya and perestroika as enacted by Mikhail Gorbachev led to the gradual loss of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's iron grip over its constituent federal republics.

In Turkmenistan, the national conservative Agzybirlik (Unification) took up the cause of independence and gained a significant base among native Turkmens.

However, in what the first multi-party election to the Supreme Soviet (1990), multiple independent candidates won and propagated nationalist sentiments.

Despite this, in the March 1991 referendum, 98% of voters proposed to preserve the Turkmen SSR as an equal sovereign republic of the USSR.

The independence referendum was held in this context, and with the aim of rebranding Niyazov as an able leader in the testing times of transition and to pave the way to eventual autocracy.