The latest statement by President Nazarbayev’s political advisor Ermukhamet Ertysbayev has literally turned the community of political commentators upside down. In his July 25 interview for the reputable Russian newspaper Kommersant, Ertysbayev said that if Kazakhstan’s President was to prematurely relinquish his responsibilities, his son-in-law Timur Kulibayev would be most likely to succeed him. This statement follows a recent publication in the German tabloid Bild, which reported about Nazarbayev’s hospitalization in one of Hamburg’s most prominent clinics. According to the German press, Nazarbayev might have been diagnosed with cancer and has visited the University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf to receive expensive treatment. This information, though strongly denied by the Kazakh Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Kazakhstan’s Embassy in Berlin, is now subject to lively discussions about the future of the current president and his political heritage.
Mukhtar Ablyazov, President Nazarbayev’s major opponent and currently exiled in London, has earlier told the Respublika newspaper that Timur Kulibayev, currently in control of the Samruk-Kazyna Sovereign Welfare Fund responsible for 54 percent of Kazakhstan’s GDP, is too weak to face competition from other representatives of Kazakhstan’s political elite. In Ablyazov’s view, the best placed contender for the presidency would be Prime Minister Karim Massimov, an experienced economist and financier, who guided the country through and out of the world economic crisis starting in 2008. The only disadvantages of Massimov’s bid would be his Uyghur origin, his poor knowledge of the Kazakh language and his lack of popular support within Kazakhstan’s population of 16-million. At the same time, as Ablyazov confided, Massimov benefits from the trust of a group of influential entrepreneurs, known as “oligarchs”, who are in possession of Kazakhstan’s vast energy resources and are interested in maintaining the status quo in order to secure their lucrative jobs.
Most experts believe that the Kommersant commentary seeks to take the teeth out of Mukhat Ablyazov’s statements aimed against both Kulibayev and Massimov, known to be if not friends, at least long-time partners and close associates. According to Ertysbayev, Kulibayev’s experience as the head of several energy companies in Kazakhstan and his direct participation in the management of the presidential family’s affairs impart considerable weight to his eventual bid for the highest public office in the country. “I know Timur Kulibayev quite well. He graduated from the Moscow State University, used to be one of the best students, is endowed with systemic reasoning and has wide professional experience acquired not only throughout his years of work in Samruk-Kazyna but also in previous jobs. Though he did not work in Government and was not a regional governor, he has learnt much through the prism of public and political management”, said Ertysbayev, referring to Kulibayev’s background. At the same time, President Nazarbayev’s long-time aide did not exclude the most active participation of Prime Minister Massimov in the definition of the country’s future political course, given his own administrative and media resources.
Though it is still neither clear whether the issue of succession is being seriously discussed in the highest corridors of power, nor who is most likely to take over the reins in case of Nazarbayev’s sudden decision to step down, most observers do concur that a political slugfest among the strongest candidates has already been announced. Whilst Nazarbayev officially remains in office till 2016 as a result of his April 3 reelection, his deteriorating health may speed up the designation of a successor for the purpose of ensuring political continuity and preserving the fragile balance of power among regional clans.
At a time when bets are being made on who will be the next person to run the ninth largest country in the world by area, the internal political situation seems to remain rather tense. The Mangystau region in Western Kazakhstan has been engulfed for weeks with mass protests of oil sector workers dissatisfied with low salaries and intolerable working conditions. Their cause has become an issue of international concern, prompting the British pop-star Sting to cancel his concert on the occasion of the Astana Day on July 6. Another stumbling block for Western Kazakhstan’s regional administration is the increased activity of radical Islamic organizations, which regularly attack police patrols and district outposts. On July 22, the governor of the Aktobe region, where elite forces and local law enforcement agents tried for weeks to destroy a few extremist cells responsible for the killing of two police officers, was promptly replaced by presidential decree.