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POLITICAL “CRISIS” IN KAZAKHSTAN: NOTHING PERSONAL?
TIMUR POLJANNIKOV,
Political scientist, State University-Higher School of Economics, Moscow
Some experts have qualified the current political situation in Kazakhstan a “crisis”. On the one hand, within the week – from May 16 to 22 – the dramatic changes were made in the Constitution of Kazakhstan, which consist in transition from the presidential to presidential-parliamentary republic.
Political system of the Republic of Kazakhstan is evolving:
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the status of the legislative branch (the bicameral Parliament) becomes higher;
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the number of MPs has been increased;
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the government will be formed by the parliamentary majority;
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the proportional system of the elections to the Lower Chamber of Parliament (the Majilis) has been introduced;
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the Senate members will not belong to any political party.
At the same time, the President’s positions have been strengthened: he acquires legislative initiative, gets wider powers to create, reorganize and abolish the government bodies etc. After 2012 the presidential term will be reduced from 7 to 5 years, and neither adherents nor adversaries of the constitutional changes object to this. The opposition objects to the fact that current president Nursultan Nazarbayev can be elected for more than two terms running, while future presidents are denied this potential.
On the other hand, the constitutional changes were made and approved against the specific background of deteriorating political situation. On May 26, Rakhat Aliyev, husband of the president Nursultan Nazarbayev's eldest daughter Dariga, was dismissed from all the government posts. Later on, the law enforcement agencies accused him of grave criminal offences, he was put on the international wanted list and sought political asylum in Austria. At present, the Austrian public prosecutor’s office is examining Kazakhstan’s inquiry about extradition of Aliyev to his motherland and the possibility of taking him into custody.
The situation has evolved within a week… Is the case against Aliyev connected with the reforms of the Kazakh Constitution?
At first sight, it may seem to be so: right after the “repressions” had begun, Rakhat Aliyev openly declared that the reason for the conflict is that he and the president have “different views about the future of the country”, and recently he has told Nazarbayev point-blank that he is going to run for president in 2012… But all these declarations look like putting up a good front. Considering the existing system, it is doubtful that Aliyev can become one of the pretenders to Nazarbayev’s legacy. When he had the career carte blanche in business and politics (mainly, in the military, security and law enforcement agencies) he proved to be a tough and aggressive man. As a result, under the patronage of Nazarbayev, Aliyev and his wife had created a powerful elite clan (with its administrative, military, security and law enforcement, financial, party and mass media components) and then he started conflicting with the other Kazakh significant elite clans and “made some high-ranking officials his enemies”. This conflict has been dragging on for many years, and the previous crisis took place in 2001 when Aliyev was almost accused of an attempted coup d’etat and forced into “honorary diplomatic exile”.
I believe that the current crisis is also connected not with big-time politics (in terms of their natures and ethnic origins, it is inconceivable that the Kazakh high-ranking officials submitted to Rakhat Aliyev as president), but with “big business infighting” (the situation with the Joint-Stock Company “Nurbank”, accusations of raids, etc). Although, many Kazakh experts are not sure that the case against Aliyev will be tried, I think that for this once the adversary elite clans will carry the situation through. Rakhat Aliyev has been too dangerous for many politicians.
If to speak about the change of the “successor candidates” list, one can say simply that for the time being there is no such a list. The more so because the Constitution has been amended and supplemented. (There is no serious talking about Dariga Nazarbayeva, daughter of Nursultan Nazarbayev, becoming the next president, because of her gender and the abovementioned reasons).
At last, when assessing the political developments in Kazakhstan, as far as the elites have the groups pinning their hopes on Russia in their struggle for power, one can say that such groups will appear, change and be destroyed. It will depend on the short-term trend of the domestic- and foreign-policy and economic factors. In this system of factors China will be playing more and more crucial role. In this respect, the appointment of Karim Masimov as prime minister became a momentous event. However, judging by the rhetoric of the traditionally pro-Russian groups near the Kazakh president, recently there have been no changes in the country’s policy towards Russia. Unfortunately, that is true.
June 4, 2007
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