Bayaman Erkinbayev (Баяман Эркинбаев, c. 1967 - September 22, 2005) was a top Kyrgyzstani lawmaker and parliamentary deputy, who was the driving force behind the riots in southern Kyrgyzstan that led to the overthrow of President Askar Akayev on March 24, 2005.
He had announced his candidacy for the presidency in the July 2005 elections, but bowed down long before the vote, when his party supported former security chief and Bishkek mayor, Felix Kulov.
Starting out as a worker at a tobacco factory in his hometown of Osh in the south, Erkinbayev made his fame as a wrestler, and served in parliament for a decade.
Erkinbayev operated at the turbulent intersection where politics, business, sports and, sometimes, crime meet in post-Soviet Central Asia.
On September 22, 2005, however, Erkinbayev sustained bullet wounds to his neck and chest, when he was attacked by unidentified assailants from behind some bushes after arriving home by car late that day.