Tag Archives: Kazakhstan

Kazakh President reshuffles anti-corruption unit

OCT. 20 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kazakh president, Nursultan Nazarbayev sacked Abdrashit Zhukenov and Ali Komekbayev from their posts as the deputy chiefs of the Financial Police and Agency for Civil Service Affairs, part of a strategy to reorganise the agencies in charge of combating corruption.

Mr Nazarbayev has wanted the ministry of finance and the newly-created Agency for Civil Service Affairs and Anti- Corruption to take over managing corruption cases in a high-profile move aimed at grabbing the attention of international investors who are worried about corruption levels as much as people living inside Kazakhstan.

This year a number of high profile officials have been arrested and charged with corruption.

Muslim Omiraev, former deputy at the ministry of agriculture was arrested in December 2013 and sentenced to 10 years in prison (Oct. 16). Earlier in September, police arrested the former governor of Karaganda, Baurzhan Abdishev for corruption. He goes on trial in November.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 205, published on Oct. 22 2014)

Kazakhstan signed extradition treaty with Italy

OCT. 16 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Kazakh lower house of parliament ratified an extradition treaty with Italy, media reported, part of a process by Kazakhstan to update its legal treaties. Last year, Kazakhstan illegally transferred the wife of the then fugitive businessman Mukhtar Ablyazov from Rome.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 205, published on Oct. 22 2014)

Kazakhstan plan mega cities

OCT. 13 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kazakh officials have earmarked four cities — Almaty, Astana, Aktobe and Shymkent — to develop as mega cities. The plan to create four hubs, which has overtures of Soviet economic planning, will cost an estimated $4b and run through to 2020.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 204, published on Oct. 15 2014)

Kazakh President signs EU deal

OCT. 8-9 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kazakh president Nursultan Nazarbayev flew to Brussels to sign a deal that will bring Kazakhstan, economically, closer to the European Union.

Concerns, though, over Kazakhstan’s human rights and corruption records threatened to overshadow Mr Nazarbayev’s trip. He is also facing increased pressure over Kazakhstan’s alliance with Russia which is accused of aiding separatist fighters in Ukraine.

European Union and United States sanctions on Russia have hit linked-in economies, including Kazakhstan.

“Sanctions, especially economic ones, are not helpful to anyone neither Europe, nor Kazakhstan or Russia,” Mr Nazarbayev said at a joint press conference with Jose Manuel Barroso, the EU’s outgoing chief.

The EU-Kazakhstan agreement, which took nearly four years to sign, will boost Kazakhstan’s application to enter the World Trade Organisation, enhance energy and security cooperation and air travel links.

The so-called Enhanced Partnership and Cooperation Agreement also makes Kazakhstan the European Union’s most important partner both in Central Asia and the Russia-led Eurasian Economic Union.

Importantly tariffs remain unchanged as they are central to the Eurasian Economic Union that Kazakhstan is a member of alongside Russia and Belarus.

And this is important. Kazakhstan is trying to play both Russia and the European Union with its self-described multi-vector foreign policy. While Mr Nazarbayev talked with the European Union, Kazakh senators in Astana ratified a new Eurasian Economic Union treaty.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 204, published on Oct. 15 2014)

Consumerism grows in Kazakhstan

ALMATY/Kazakhstan, OCT. 15 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — The uniformed women with bright orange hair posted at the entrance of the Soviet-era exhibition hall in Almaty, the Palace of the Republic, were stern and explicit. Nobody was allowed in.

Behind them it was clear why.

Waves of women in turquoise suits were exiting the building, some in pairs and some in small groups.

And at the side of the Palace of the Republic, a fleet of new, shiny cars were parked, all painted an almost metallic pale pink.

The suits. The impeccably made up women wearing them. The cars. Could it be? Yes, it could. A Mary Kay convention is in town.

Mary Kay, the American cosmetics company founded by US businesswoman Mary Kay Ash back in 1963, has aggressively expanded in a range of new markets. By the looks of it this includes Kazakhstan.

The uniform tailored suits are a hallmark of Mary Kay saleswomen, and the cars are a reference to the founder’s pink Cadillac, which has become a trademark for top salespeople.

Convention participants, mainly middle-aged, filtered out of the Palace of the Republic. Some posed in front of the brutalist Hotel Kazakhstan just adjacent to the Palace; others made their way via the subway under Dostyk Avenue to Kimep Grill, a canteen in the basement of the Kazakhstan Institute of Management, Economics, & Strategic Research. Here the food is cheap and decent and the queues are long.

The mostly ethnic Kazakh students seemed wildly amused at the uniformed women in their midst. One laughed and then turned to her friend: “They’re all dressed the same.”

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 204, published on Oct. 15 2014)

CU bolsters Tajik security

OCT. 10 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – At a meeting of CIS heads of states in Minsk, Tajik president Emomali Rakhmon said Belarus and Armenia had already given it aid to bolster security along its border with Afghanistan. Tajikistan wants to join the Russia-led Eurasian Economic Union which counts Belarus and Kazakhstan as members. Armenia is joining in 2015.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 204, published on Oct. 15 2014)

Kazakh Kashagan pipes to cost $3.6b

OCT. 10 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Replacing the pipes running from the Kashagan oil site in the Kazakh sector of the Caspian Sea to the mainland could cost up to $3.6b, Reuters reported quoting an energy ministry document. Kashagan is already the world’s most expensive oil project. Production has been delayed because of leaky gas pipes.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 204, published on Oct. 15 2014)

Kazakh city expects Olympic win

OCT. 7 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Almaty is talking up its chances of hosting the Winter Olympic Games in 2022. A spokesman for the country’s sovereign wealth fund Samruk- Kazyna, which is promoting the bid, said it was almost certain to win the Games after Oslo dropped out. Beijing is the other candidate city.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 204, published on Oct. 15 2014)

Kazakh bank received negative ratings

OCT. 14 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Ratings agency Standard & Poors placed Kazkommertzbank, one of the biggest banks in Kazakhstan, on a negative ratings watch because of its purchase of BTA Bank. BTA Bank was bought from the government in what analysts have said was a political, rather than business, move. BTA Bank owned a large amount of bad debt.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 204, published on Oct. 15 2014)

Kazakh government to generate billions

OCT. 8 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Kazakh government said it would restructure Kazakhstan’s sovereign wealth fund Samruk-Kazyna in order to generate $11.2b in sales and savings.

Costs will be cut and unwanted assets sold off through the much vaunted, but still-to-emerge, People’s IPO.

The government wants to half the number of companies administered by the fund and sell up to 10% in selected strategic national companies such as electric grid operator KEGOC, energy holding Samruk-Energo, railroad major Kazakhstan Temir Zholy, and the national nuclear agency KazAtomProm.

Samruk-Kazyna is the main tool through which the Kazakh government controls companies. The fund accounts for 10.5% of Kazakhstan’s GDP and its assets are valued at $100b.

The timing of such a large restructuring is important. Economic growth rates across the region have been halved over the past few months as Russia’s sanction-hit economy tips into recession.

It may just have been time to for the Kazakh government to get serious about cutting costs and raising revenue.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 204, published on Oct. 15 2014)