APRIL 6 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakhstan’s Kashagan oil field will be shut for another two years while faulty gas pipelines are replaced, unnamed sources close to the deal told the qz.com website. The $50b Kashagan project was supposed to have turned Kazakhstan into an energy superpower. Instead it has become a major headache for the government.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 179, published on April 9 2014)
APRIL 2 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — A bribery investigation at Swedish- Finnish telecoms company TeliaSonera appeared to widen from Uzbekistan, its initial focus, to other companies it owns in Central Asia and the South Caucasus after it said some other business deals may have been illegal. TeliaSonera owns Kcell, Kazakhstan’s largest mobile provider.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 179, published on April 9 2014)
APRIL 7 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — The spectre of Kazakh police shooting dead oil workers during a strike in 2011 haunts trade union members who are now too afraid of the security forces to launch long-term industrial action.
The issue of workers’ rights in Kazakhstan surged into the public consciousness in December 2011 after police shot dead at least 15 people in the scruffy western oil town of Zhanaozen, bringing to an end a six month strike aimed at increasing oil workers’ salaries.
In an interview with The Conway Bulletin in Almaty, Aleksei Nigai, deputy head of the small Odak union, said that although conditions for workers in general had not improved since 2011, workers avoided long stand offs with the security forces.
“Since then [Zhanaozen], there have been more and more strikes but the scale has been modest because workers fear the government’s reaction,” he said.
“Nobody wants to be shot for a salary increase.”
Mr Nigai was talking just a few days after a four-day strike hit an oil services company in western Kazakhstan.
He also said the government was planning to introduce legislation that would increase the punishment for strikes not authorised and organised by the official government-linked union.
In other words, Mr Nigai said, the Kazakh state wanted a Potemkin union system that it could easily control.
“There will be only one umbrella organisation, the Federation, which is appointed by the President,” he said with a sigh and a shrug.
“Tell me how this is different to, say, Turkmenistan.”
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 179, published on April 9 2014)
APRIL 6 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazkommertsbank (KazKom), Kazakhstan’s biggest lender, said it made a profit of $288m last year, turning around a loss in 2012. KazKom’s ratio of non-performing loans, though, remained a stubbornly high 32.4%. Kazakhstan has made a priority of reducing its non-performing loans.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 179, published on April 9 2014)
APRIL 8 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — With Russia’s annexation of Crimea firmly in mind, Kazakhstan’s parliament is likely to pass laws that will criminalise separatist action, media reported. Kazakhstan’s north is home to a large Russian minority which it worries will follow the example of Crimea and try to join Russia.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 179, published on April 9 2014)
APRIL 7 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — International sanctions imposed on Russia because of its de facto annexation of Crimea will adversely affect Kazakh exports, Kazakhstan’s energy minister Uzakbai Karabalin told parliament. Mr Karabalin said that Kazakhstan may look to increase oil exports via Azerbaijan, China and Iran.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 179, published on April 9 2014)
APRIL 2 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev re-shuffled his government, bringing back Karim Massimov as PM.
Nurlan Nigmatulin, formerly the Nur Otan head in parliament, was promoted to replace Mr Massimov as head of the presidential administration.
Mr Nazarbayev also gave his eldest daughter Dariga Nazarbayeva a boost by promoting her to head Nur Otan in parliament. Nur Otan is Mr Nazarbayev’s political party.
The re-emergence of Mr Massimov, who had been PM between 2007 and 2012, and the promotion of Ms Nazarbayeva set off speculation over who would eventually succeed Mr Nazarbayev.
Ms Nazarbayeva, 50, has enjoyed a resurgence back into public life after winning a seat in parliament in 2012. Until 2007 she had been prominent but fell from grace when her then husband, Rakhat Aliyev, argued with her father and then fled abroad.
Both Ms Nazarbayeva and Mr Massimov are among the favourites to succeed Mr Nazarbayev when he finally steps aside.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 179, published on April 9 2014)
APRIL 1 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakh police arrested Valery Shevelyov, a director at Kazakh nuclear agency Kazatomprom, and his deputy, Serik Abdrazakov, for corruption. In 2009, Kazakhstan jailed Mukhtar Dzhakishev, then head of Kazatomprom and an opposition figurehead, for 14 years for corruption.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 178, published on April 2 2014)
MARCH 27 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Although electronic transactions are growing, Kazakhstan is still a predominantly cash-based society, analysis has shown.
Last year the number of credit and debit cards in circulation grew by 20% in Kazakhstan but the amount of electronic transactions by only 9%.
It feels as if consumers in Kazakhstan still have a mental aversion to using cashless payment models.
Payday for government workers in Kazakhstan is on the 10th day of each month. That’s when the tell-tale queues of people converting their electronic salaries into hard cash form outside branches of Halyk Bank.
It’s also a symbolic illustration of the problem that the Kazakh Central Bank needs to address.
Switching to a more cashless society is important as it is a mark of development. An increased number of electronic transactions in an economy also means that more taxes are paid and the financial system is, generally, more robust.
Alisher, a worker at Eurasia Bank in Almaty, puzzled over the problem.
“Our cards do not carry charges for electronic payments, yet customers refrain from using them,” he said. “Instead they pay withdrawal fees or simply forget that the piece of plastic they are carrying in their wallet is actually an instrument that could save them money and time.”
The problem, though, is not purely the mentality of the consumers. Many shops in Kazakhstan still do not have the right equipment. This is changing, though, and from July 1, new laws will mean that all shops will have to carry card reading machines.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 178, published on April 2 2014)
APRIL 1 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — The 20% devaluation of the tenge earlier this year will trigger an increase in bad debt, Roman Kornev, director of financial institutions at Fitch Ratings said. The Kazakh government wants to reduce the amount of non-performing loans on banks’ portfolios.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 178, published on April 2 2014)
