Nazarbaev Hints at Another Term

Kazak president Nursultan Nazarbaev has said his decision whether to stand in the next election will depend on his health and his will to do the job. NBCentralAsia observers see this as a sign he intends to serve one more term.



Nazarbaev offered the hints about his stance for the next presidential election in 2012 at a meeting of the Council of Foreign Investors in Ust-Kamenogorsk in northern Kazakstan at the end of last week.



Commenting on the fact that constitutional amendments adopted on May 22 give him, as Kazakstan’s first ever president, the right to stand for election as many times as he likes, Nazarbaev said he agreed to the provision atthe insistence of most parliamentarians.



NBCentralAsia observers believe Nazarbaev plans to carry on for at least another term, going against popular speculation that he is ready to pick a successor.



Commentator Petr Svoik is sure Nazarbaev will stand in 2012 because he has gathered so much power in his hands that even handpicking a successor would not guarantee that he would retain his political influence after stepping down.



Svoik said Nazarbaev’s announcement would not seriously change the dynamics of Kazakstan’s political struggle.



“The real players in the struggle for power have never had any illusions that Nazarbaev would ever refuse to stand for election,” he said.



The constitutional amendments adopted in May have sparked some debate. Anton Morozov, an expert from the Kazakstan Institute for Strategic Studies, says the changes have bolstered the president’s powers while simultaneously undermining the extended influence given to parliament.



Morozov believes it may have been the provision allowing Nazarbaev to stand again that sparked the scandal surrounding the president’s family.



In late May, the president sacked his ex-son-in-law Rahat Aliev as ambassador to Austria and envoy to the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe after he was charged in connection with the kidnapping of two former heads of major bank, Nurbank.



Aliev has argued that he is the victim of political persecution because he privately told the president that he wanted to run in the 2012 election.



According to Morozov, Nazarbaev’s hint that he might go on for another term will be largely welcomed not just by the various political elites, but also by most members of the public.



“People weren’t just expecting this, they wanted it to happen,” he said. “Most people associate their [social and economic] welfare with the first president. For them, it’s a guarantee of stable development.”



(News Briefing Central Asia draws comment and analysis from a broad range of political observers across the region.)