Early Parliamentary elections took place in Kazakhstan. Beforehand the President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev underlined that “the elections to Majilis are to become a new step of democratization of Kazakh society and our political system”. And already now we can positively declare that this stage has come.
As known three political parties have passed into the Parliament. 83 places in the renovated lower chamber of the Parliament shall go to “Nur Otan”, which gained more 80% of votes, eight – the party “Ak Zhol” (7,47%) and seven – Communist People’s Party of Kazakhstan (7,19%). It can be expected that appearance of new people with new ideas and images on the future of the republic shall make Parliamentary discussions even more acute and the “products” of the Parliament – decrees and laws – of higher quality, considering views of various layers of the population.
Before getting into details of oncoming changes, it should be considered that now in the country they discuss an option of transformation of Presidential system into Presidential-Parliamentary. That is why we observed the liquidation of monopoly of the ruling “Nur Otan” to represent in the legislative body of the country. Changes shall also touch upon the powers of the Parliament, it shall participate in state management more actively.
75% votes of Kazakhstani constituency took part in voting, which proves the legitimacy of elected Parliament. As observes and political analysts wrote earlier, such results could be foreseen beforehand. Party building in Kazakhstan is far from its finish, in general population orients on non-party programs, often non-logical and contradicting, mostly doubling each other, and on prominent personalities heading party lists. And it’s not the fault of a Kazakhstani voter that more often than others they choose the President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev, attracting a voter not only with clear programs but also many-years practice of real accomplishment of these programs.
On the other hand with the development of society its stratification together with the increase of well-being of individual groups of population promotes inevitably, as well as the interests difference grows. And not all parties ground their programs on critics. Extension of authorities of the Parliament can give more effective use of such suggestions, shall allow solving economic and political contradictions within legal field till contradictions reach the critical phase.
Some experts suggest that collisions in Janaozen could have been avoided, if labor laws were more clear and considered the interests of both parties within labor conflicts. And others do not exclude that collisions were really provoked by outer forces. For example by the protests of oilmen, in order to enhance tension in Kazakh society and discredit the President himself, were used by migrant political rivals of Nazarbayev. In particular, living in London disgraced oligarch Mukhtar Ablyazov and living Vienna ex son-in-law of Kazakhstani President Rakhat Aliyev. It’s pretty possible, as local analysts suppose, that behind the disorders also stood the representatives of local elite, that feel themselves deprived by the division of dividends from development of oil-gas fields. Noticeable is that in this region separatist spirits are pretty strong.
So it turned out that now in the Parliament of Kazakhstan appeared “right-wing” (“Ak-Zhol” represents national bourgeois), and left-wing – renovated communists, that are ready to promote their ideas in legislative assembly and not in streets. Talking about new scheme of political forces distribution, Kazakhstani political analyst Danyar Ashimbayev observes the situation as follows: “Each of the parties has its fascinating personalities, good economists and lawyers that are able to contribute into the work of the new Parliament a lot. I’m absolutely sure that even 2-3 such prominent oppositional politicians in the Parliament are able to change the image of Majilis”.
This view is shared also by Russian political analyst Dmitry Zhuravliov. “Many-party system is an open struggle of views, it is competition, which means efficiency. Debates for sure shall become more acute and reasoned. Eventually, many-party system shall allow illustrating more adequately the variety of ideas of Kazakhstan citizens”, - he considers.
On the eve of the elections Alexey Vlasov, General Director of Information-Analytical Center on Post-Soviet Processes Studies at MSU, declared: “According to preliminary estimations the Parliament of Kazakhstan shall include minimum three parties. Naturally, this is the party of ruling power – “People’s Democratic Party “Nur-Otan”.. Then it is the party “Ak Zhol”. And who is going to take the third place to my mind is the main intrigue between the party “Adilet” and the Communist People’s Party of Kazakhstan”. And he appeared to be right.
Less optimistic were the forecasts of the employee of the Institute of Oriental Studies of Russian Academy of Science Alexandra Kniazeva: “Some Kazakhstani colleagues talk about possible entrance into the Parliament of the third political force, but most are prone to that it is unlikely, and this shall be a great luck for demonopolization of political sphere if the second after the most popular (which shall be “Nur Otan”) party shall cross 7% barrier, anticipated by the electoral law of the Republic of Kazakhstan”.
And still a lot was spoken about possible appearance of the third party-claimant to the Parliament. The point of elections, as the Director of International Projects of the Institute of National Strategy of Russia Yury Solozobov defined is that “the moment comes, when political top structure in the country had to be brought into correspondence with democratic reality… It’s logic that the Republic should enter into the new stage of its development with fully updated political system, with new efficient senate and significantly renovated stuff of the Majilis, most likely, at many-party basis”. As we can observe, this renovation is in process.
In its turn, Kazakh political analyst Dosym Satlayev considers, that the number of parties in the new Parliament is not the main point. More important is that whether the new stuff of Parliament shall differ from its predecessors considering extension of authorities and whether the representatives of new parties shall be included into the government. To his mind, this shall illustrate greater the level of democratization of Kazakhstan. It is also significant who exactly shall enter the new Parliament under party lists. And the most important – how new people shall act in a new situation, are they really able to lead dialogue and are their ideas so determined.
Speaking about the way Kazakhstan shall look after the elections, the experts of the IAC of Lomonosov MSU Ivan Dmitriyev reminds, that early dissolution of the Parliament was related with potential occurrence of another wave of world crises. And that is why exactly economic programs and the ways of their accomplishment should become the ground for activity of newly-elected deputies.
“The program of diversification of economies, around which should shape the priority issues of growth for the coming five-seven years, hasn’t yet been finalized. Moreover, the risks which are related with possible fall of energy prices, can slow down for a while the move of the country in this direction. This can mean that the new stuff of the Majilis will have seriously to deal with development and adoption of laws, aimed to support the actions of executive power in the frameworks of anti-crisis program,” – he says.
Naturally, the activity of deputies shall not be limited with that. The events in Janaozen demonstrated the urgency of a more extended dialogue between people and authorities including employers.
Kazakhstan is not isolated from the rest of the world. And that is why the issues of extremism and terrorism, unfamiliar to the country before, shall also demand close focus. To define these problems urgent is consolidation of all constructive forces of the society, which should happen after Parliamentary elections.
World media monitoring
27.01.2012
