BACKGROUND: These elections were of great interest to the entire region, but particularly relevant to the OSCE countries due to Kazakhstan’s ambition to take over the OSCE presidency in 2009, an issue that will be decided in 2006. None of the previous elections, that is the 1999 presidential election or last year’s parliamentary election, were deemed to have fully complied with Kazakhstan’s international commitments to free and fair elections. The electoral campaign was fairly low-key with no major issues dominating the agenda. There was a televised TV-debate, in which the incumbent Nursultan Nazarbayev did not take part, since he was on a trip to Ukraine. The alleged suicide of Almaty oblast head Zamanbek Nurkadilov was perhaps the most dramatic event during the period, but in spite of allegations relating the event to his position as a prominent opposition figure, it never really played out in the campaign. Nazarbayev himself did not officially campaign, but his campaign volunteers were out campaigning for him in bright yellow jackets. Several divisive strains exist in Kazakhstan’s society. These include territorial (centre vs. periphery, rural vs. urban), ethnic (Kazakh vs. Russian), and socioeconomic (wealthy vs. poor). The focus of attention during this presidential campaign was on economic distribution and stability. Nazarbayev had a clear platform that included substantial increases in pensions and other benefits, and the platform was released the week before the elections. This made it hard for the opposition to react to it. The main theme of the leading opposition candidate, Zharmakhan Tuyakbai, a former Nazarbayev ally, was social justice. Ordinary citizens regularly complain about the increasing gaps between the haves and the have-nots. Large-scale social unrest is nevertheless unlikely at the moment, since improvements have been promised and people generally feel disillusioned with the available alternatives. Nazarbayev is clearly popular, receiving approval rates of ca. 70-80 percent in opinion polls over the past few years. A crucial remaining democratic problem is the freedom of the press. This problem became obvious during the campaign, as opposition newspapers were confiscated at several occasions. The post-election period also saw similar cases, for example when Kazakh authorities a week after the elections seized the entire print run of the post-election issue of the opposition newspaper “Juma Times”. According to most observers, election day itself went relatively well, apart from a few cases of serious irregularities in counting and tabulation. Taking into consideration that one of the key problems in post-Soviet countries is the actual implementation of laws and regulations, seeing that parts of the election administration had really improved inspired hope. When democratic principles trickle down to the polling station level, they might be hard to turn around, even if authorities would so desire. The main problem with this campaign was not Election Day but the pre-election period, with remaining problems for opposition candidates to get coverage in media and restrictions on the freedom of assembly. Nazarbayev won a landslide victory with 91 percent of the vote, according to preliminary results. Tuyakbai, the main opposition candidate out of four, got a meager 6,6 percent of the vote. Turnout was as high as 75 percent according to the preliminary results, and observers did witness long lines at polling stations.

IMPLICATIONS: The main short-term implication of the election is the further consolidation of Nazarbayev’s power. Public unrest is at this point not a threat to the ruling elite, and the opposition has specifically chosen not to seek to generate unrest. What the ruling elite is vulnerable to, however, is charges of mismanagement of public office, especially cases involving high-level corruption such as the Giffin case, a corruption case involving an American oil consultant accused of bribing Kazak officials. Such corruption cases can have a detrimental effect on the popularity of the newly re-elected president. The further consolidation of Nazarbayev’s power poses a challenge to future improvements of the rule of law and democratic governance in the country. The key question for the next several months is whether the President will choose to devolve some political power to the parliament, as in Ukraine, or whether the Russian model of further centralization is applied. Interestingly, Nazarbayev and his two main contenders all support the idea of having regional governors elected instead of appointed. For Nazarbayev, it will be a real challenge to move beyond patronage and co-optation of political opponents as a method of ruling. There are broadly speaking two alternatives for Kazakhstan. One is to promote loyalty to an inclusive and democratic state, which is the path of civic democracy. The other is to go along a more nationalistic and exclusive line, which might in its worst form lead to ethnocracy. The latter would further estrange the large Russian minority in Kazakhstan. If a more inclusive form of governance was introduced it would give the people a higher stake in the state and therefore create loyalty to the state. This may sound abstract and lofty, but in Kazakhstan these issues have a tangible relevance. Even though Kazakhstan has enjoyed rapid economic growth and substantial poverty reduction for the last years, social tensions might nevertheless emerge as a threat to the political stability of the country. If the government chooses to speed up public sector reform and indiscriminately deliver along the lines of its promises, it would effectively disarm the opposition. The opposition might still regroup and formulate new critiques, but absent social discontent, it would have a hard time succeeding.

CONCLUSIONS: The presidential election in Kazakhstan offered both encouraging and discouraging signals. The positive developments of the election day set the standard for future elections in Kazakhstan, something that Nazarbayev’s daughter Dariga, considered to be the next in line for the post, must be aware of. The country unquestionably faces huge challenges in its lengthy and cumbersome transition to more democratic forms of government. In the short term stability prevails, but the underlying societal tensions stand the risk of acquiring a more revolutionary character if the re-elected president proves unable to deliver according to his election promises. The president is clearly popular, but nevertheless not immune to charges of misuse of public office. Combating corruption and ensuring more transparency in the work of the government is a challenge to the current leadership, given the widespread nature of patronage. A discouraging element of the last election was the restrictions on the right of assembly and the harassment of opposition media. In the near future, Nazarbayev has a golden opportunity to take the allegations of election irregularities seriously and to make sure that the judicial system solves the disputes in an impartial and timely manner. This is a test of his sincerety in moving beyond electoral authoritarianism. This is a process that will be closely followed by the international community.

AUTHOR’S BIO: Fredrik M. Sjöberg is a junior fellow at the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute and Silk Road Studies Program, Joint Transatlantic Research and Policy Center at Johns Hopkins University-SAIS and Uppsala University, Sweden. He holds a BA in International Relations from Stockholm University and an MA in Development Studies from Uppsala University. He took part as an election observer for the OSCE to Kazakhstan during the presidential elections in December 2005.