Kazakhstan to hold snap presidential elections after year of chaos

In a snap election on Sunday, the president of Kazakhstan, who oversaw a brutal uprising early this year and later tried to marginalise some of the long-time influential players in the Central Asian nation, appears destined to win a second term against unknown challengers.

President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev is up for reelection against a field of five contenders. They haven’t had much time to mount substantial challenges because their campaign only lasted a short while and started in late October. Tokayev skipped a nationally broadcast election debate, seemingly content with his obvious advantage.

Tokayev has taken moves to maintain Kazakhstan’s isolation from longtime ally and major regional power Russia, which coincides with the election for a seven-year term. He made it clear that his nation did not recognise the Ukrainian regions that Russia had recognised as sovereign nations at the commencement of the February conflict.

Thousands of thousands of Russians left after President Vladimir Putin ordered conscription in September, and Kazakhstan has since taken them in.

It was widely anticipated that Tokayev, who took office as president in 2019 after Nursultan Nazarbayev resigned, would continue the authoritarian policies of the man who had governed the resource-rich nation since it earned independence from the Soviet Union.

As the leader of the National Security Council, Nazarbayev continued to have a significant influence, and the capital was renamed Nur-Sultan in his honour.

Then, in January, a wave of violence rocked the nation as provincial protests that had been initially sparked by an increase in the price of fuel spread to other cities, particularly the commercial capital Almaty, and overtly turned political as protesters chanted “Old man out!” in reference to Nazarbayev. Police brutally put down the unrest, killing more than 220 persons, the majority of whom were protestors.

Tokayev dismissed Nazarbayev from his position on the Security Council amidst the violence. He changed the name of the capital back to Astana, and the Kazakh Parliament overturned a law that had given Nazarbayev and his family immunity from prosecution.

Tokayev later pushed through reforms that strengthened the parliament, reduced presidential authority, and limited the presidency to a single seven-year term. If he wins Sunday’s election, this would allow him to hold office until 2029.

“There may be optimism when it comes to (Tokayev’s) promise to reform the political system even as concerns remain that Tokayev will ultimately prioritise his own interests – and those of other elites – over the cause of democratisation,” analyst Temur Umarov wrote in a commentary for the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Since Tokayev’s current term would expire in 2024, some critics have argued that the snap election for the seven-year term is more of an attempt by him to extend his tenure in office than a genuine reform effort.