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What has the last year shown? To what extent the first president is involved in the active social and political life of Kazakhstan now?
There has been a certain evolution of relationships. Still, in Kazakhstan such a model — the presence of two presidents — was not applied, and some issues, even taking into account the experience and diplomacy of the two presidents, were worked out on the fly.
If at first the First President stepped aside, then, starting from the summer of last year, he became more active and indicated his presence, while demonstratively not pushing his powers.
This continued until the recent meeting of the Samruk-Kazyna Fund Management Board (held on June 3 under the chairmanship of the first president). The fund did not fulfill the instructions of Kassym-Zhomart Tokayev to increase transfers to the budget, but it did report in detail on its plans, reorganization and financial movements to the first president. It seems that there is no dual power, but there is a feeling that the political dominance of the first president is becoming more and more obvious.
The first president, in addition to the Assembly of the People of Kazakhstan and other structures, controls the power structures. That is, the power structures and the quasi-state sector in the form of Samruk-Kazyna remained under the control of the first president.
Now the elite is guided by two presidents. Mayors are subordinate as mayors to the second president, as heads of regional branches of the Nur Otan party — to the first.
We see how the position of Prime Minister Askar Mamin, who was appointed by Nursultan Nazarbayev before the change of power, has strengthened. He took over a significant portion of the executive branch. The prime minister's report on the execution of last year's budget was characteristically tough. Prior to that, Natalia Godunova (chairman of the committee for monitoring the execution of the republican budget. — Ed.) raised certain questions, but the final hearing was short and concise.
Almost a third center of power is being formed. But the problem is that, despite the general work of the cabinet of ministers, we have a serious problem with the social block and it’s ministries. And the chosen course and their work do not justify themselves.
There is a mess around the second quarantine, there are failures in the work of the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Education and Science. We see that no lessons are being learned from the first quarantine. And given that this concerns a huge number of people and the authorities have already said that the 42,500 allowance will not be paid, the situation is becoming more and more threatening. Power stepped on a rake and continues to step on them.
And there are no people around Kassym-Zhomart Tokayev who can offer a competent strategy for economic reforms, public administration reforms, and options for solving health problems. It can be seen that the second president faced a serious crisis with governability.
We need a strategy of reforms, not just political reforms, but reforms of public administration and the economy. However, the truth is, there is no one who can offer this program. The government is solving only operational problems, the proposed measures are focused on a medium-term effect. There are no ideas, projects or plans coming from Akorda, while the Library is now busy with something else.
If some kind of reform concept arises, if it is reasonably and competently built, what prevents the leader of the nation and the head of state from discussing these issues? It must be remembered that Nursultan Nazarbayev is not a conservative, he initiated a lot of reforms, he was not afraid to nominate young people, he easily took anti-crisis measures. He has a fairly deep understanding of the foundations of the economy of Kazakhstan and its social issues. If you present a sensible reform plan, the Elbasy can easily accept it with competent argumentation. The problem is that no one has this reform plan.
The previous model simply does not work in the context of the external economic environment, the next fall in oil prices, and quarantine. In this system there is no bookmark for crises — crises that are now quite serious — and we see that this model cannot cope with it.
We must admit that we are approaching a certain crisis of power and a crisis of ideas. I hope that after the anniversary events some certainty will be introduced into these issues.
The Library is focused on protecting the two basic principles of Nazarbayev's policy — stability and harmony. It expertly raised the awareness that reforms are good, but a certain continuity of the course, in those issues that the first president has been promoting for 30 years, must be maintained.
No matter what radical economic reforms were undertaken, no matter what crises they faced, for the first president, the preservation of stability and harmony was a base and a priority. Now he, having handed over the post of president to Kassym-Zhomart Tokayev, apparently expects from him certain messages in this direction.
Tokayev partly justifies these expectations: he travels to troubled areas — Arys, Kordai. During the first quarantine, he almost single-handedly offered packages to solve aggravated social and economic problems. But I think the Library is waiting for a more exhaustive vision, like all of us.
Daniyar Ashimbaev, political scientist, leading researcher at the Institute for Security and Cooperation in Central Asia
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