Tag Archives: government

Kazakhs say Massimov was sacked as PM for failures

ASTANA, SEPT. 20 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — While Western analysts were studying the latest reshuffle of senior Kazakh officials by President Nursultan Nazarbayev to try to decipher what it all means for the succession issue, ordinary Kazakhs were instead saluting the changes as a result of the country’s poor economic health.

A Conway Bulletin correspondent took to the streets in Astana to gauge how the reshuffle was received.

“Changing the PM was a necessary step after failure with land reforms, as the old government was under pressure from people and activists,” said Nurlyayim, a 24-year-old Astana resident.

Earlier this year, thousands of people across Kazakhstan had protested against changes to the land code. Karim Massimov was moved by Mr Nazarbayev from the PM’s position to head of the security services. Most analysts had said that this was an important sign of Mr Nazarbayev’s trust in Mr Massimov. Locals, clearly, saw it differently.

Lyazzat, 29, also said that Mr Massimov had effectively been sacked.

“In my opinion, the president made a major reshuffle because the government led by Mr Massimov failed to elaborate an anti-crisis strategy,” she said.

Rustem, 35, an Astana resident highlighted the move of Imangali Tasmaganbetov from the minister of defence to deputy PM.

“I know Tasmaganbetov as a good politician, who is capable of bringing some positive changes,” he said.

Again this is different from the analysts’ line of thinking who said Mr Tamagambetov had been demoted. Importantly, locals didn’t highlight Dariga Nazarbayeva’s move from deputy PM into the senate as important. Mr Nazarbayev’s eldest daughter is seen as a potential successor.

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(News report from Issue No. 297, published on Sept. 23 2016)

Armenia’s ruling party sags in local elections

SEPT. 18 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Armenia’s ruling Republican Party lost a series of local elections, a reflection, observers said, of the drop in popularity for President Serzh Sargsyan and his government.

The elections focused on voting in civil leaders in small towns and villages across Armenia.

The Central Election Commission said that 350,000 people had voted in the election, a turnout of around 50%, giving it credibility as an opinion poll on the president.

Media reports said that of the 317 local governing bodies where voting took place, the Republican Party won 161. Importantly, though, it lost control of 30 towns and villages that it had previously held.

Analysts said that this was a reflection of the lack of trust in the Republican Party which has dominated Armenian politics since 2003. The economy is stagnant and a group of gunmen captured a police triggering a two week stand-off with police.

Earlier this month Hovik Abrahamyan resigned as Armenia’s PM. He had been in the job for two years but said that a new government was needed to restore confidence in the government.

President Sargsyan quickly appointed Karen Karapetyan as the new PM. He is a former mayor of Yerevan.

Hovannes Sahakian, a Reublican Party MP, said the worse-than-expected results were attributable to some poor local politics.

“There are many problems in those three dozen communities,” he told the RFE/RL’s Armenian service. “We need to revise things, change the strategy and tactics. What happened is not a tragedy.”

President Sargsyan has not commented on the results of the elections.

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(News report from Issue No. 297, published on Sept. 23 2016)

Georgia condemns Russia on polling stations

SEPT. 19 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Georgian government condemned Russia’s use of polling stations in the breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia for its parliamentary election on Sept. 18. Georgia’s foreign ministry said in a statement that the issuing of Russian passports to people in South Ossetia and Abkhazia breached Georgia’s sovereignty and was illegal.

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(News report from Issue No. 297, published on Sept. 23 2016)

Berik Imashev: Nazarbayev’s key man

SEPT. 23 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev knows the lynchpin for delivering an ordered succession handover is the Central Election Commission (CEC).

With a trusted loyalist running the CEC — which oversees elections, decides on the eligibility of candidates and approves senators and MPs — Nazarbayev’s chances of delivering a smooth succession are improved.

Kazakhstan’s political class is riven through with different power groups vying for influence. There are rivals to Nazarbayev who are looking for weaknesses to exploit.

Nazarbayev’s appointment of Berik Imashev to head the CEC means that these opponents won’t find any weaknesses there.

Arguably it was the most important appointment in a wider reshuffle earlier his month, although the move of Karim Massimov from PM to head the security services, Dariga Nazarbayeva’s shift into the Senate and Imangali Tasmagambetov’s drift from the defence ministry into the deputy PM’s seat, grabbed the headlines.

Imashev is the definition of an arch-Nazarbayev loyalist. From the late 1990s, the 56-year-old has spent his career serving Nazarbayev, first as one of his advisers and then as deputy speaker of the Senate, deputy chairman of the State Security Council and most recently, from 2012, as justice minister.

It will now be Imashev’s job to ensure that Kazakh elections produce the right results with the right margins of victory that Nazarbayev requires.

And Imashev is well placed to do this. After all, he shares the same interests as Nazarbayev.

Known as a tough, uncompromising operator, Imashev is also married into the First Family. In 2003, his daughter, Aida, married Dariga Nazarbayev’s son Nurali. This makes both Imashev and Dariga, a favourite to succeed her father as president, grandparents to Aida and Nurali’s children. Imashev is, in effect, an extension of the Nazarbayev family.

Imashev’s appointment at the CEC also marks its subjugation as a political tool, although pretensions of independence had always been thin.

Since 2007, Kuandyk Turgankulov, had been head of the CEC. He had spent 11 years effectively training for the post as deputy chairman. By contrast, Imashev has no experience as a CEC official. His appointment is political, and a clever one.

For Nazarbayev securing the loyalty of the CEC was vital. This is now assured.

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(News report from Issue No. 297, published on Sept. 23 2016)

Mirziyoyev to run to be Uzbek president

SEPT. 16 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Acting President and PM Shavkat Mirziyoyev said he will run in the upcoming Uzbek presidential election, scheduled for Dec. 4, immediately installing himself as the favourite to win.

UzLiDeP, the party of former President Islam Karimov, nominated Mr Mirziyoyev for the top job.

Mr Mirziyoyev has served as PM since 2003. He was named acting president less than a week after Karimov died of a stroke on Sept. 2.

After the nomination, Mr Mirziyoyev praised Karimov.

“Karimov is our pride. This man brought me up, he was like a father to me,” he said.

The Central Election Commission also said that the National Revival Party nominated Sarvar Otamuradov as a contestant, although he is expected only to play the role of sparring partner.

No Western election observers have judged a vote in Uzbekistan to be either free or fair.

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(News report from Issue No. 297, published on Sept. 23 2016)f

Comment: Uzbekistan’s smooth power transition

SEPT. 16 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – In some quarters it had been feared that Islam Karimov’s death in Uzbekistan would set off instability in Central Asia’s largest country as rival groups battled for control. So far, though, the power transition in Uzbekistan since Karimov’s death on Sept. 2 has been smooth.

Shavkat Mirziyoyev, the former PM, has been installed as acting president and will, presumably, be given the job on a full-time basis at an election in December. There is still some time before his coronation can be complete but, so far, there doesn’t appear to be any other actors coming to the fore to challenge Mirziyoyev’s ascension.

There are several striking characteristic about the smooth Uzbek power shift. Firstly, it appears to have been well-organised and well-rehearsed before Karimov’s death. The authorities were able to control the information flow, apparently even delaying the official announcement of Karimov’s death until they were ready, put together a state funeral and arrange for the Speaker of the Senate to decline taking over in favour of Mirziyoyev.

There was planning and agreement in all this. Deals were made on how to retain power and status in Uzbekistan well before Karimov died.

And the second point is that Karimov must have been in on it.

He must have agreed to this succession process while he was alive. It appears that he finally gave up on the idea of installing his favourite daughter, Gulnara, as his successor in 2014. She was deeply unpopular with ordinary Uzbeks and the elite may have considered her a liability that they wanted to get out of the way before dealing with the succession issue.

Their chance came in 2013 and 2014 with corruption accusations linked to Western telecoms companies which had paid out bribes to the Karimovs seven years earlier to access the Uzbek market. The Uzbek elite were then able to imprison Gulnara’s supporters and place her under house arrest. She has not been seen or heard of since.

March 2014, marked the real transition of power in Uzbekistan. Karimov was unable to protect his daughter and most probably had to go along with plans devised by the Uzbek elite to hold on to power.

And their plan meant stripping the Karimov family of power.

In Uzbekistan this month we have seen the natural culmination of what is effectively an internal Uzbek regime change.

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(News report from Issue No. 296, published on Sept. 16 2016)

Brother of Armenia’s richest man becomes PM

SEPT. 13 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Armenia’s President Serzh Sargsyan appointed Karen Karapetyan to the post of PM, brother of one of the richest Armenians.

A member of the Mr Sargsyan’s Republican Party, Mr Karapetyan will take over from Hovik Abrahamyan, who resigned on Sept. 8, after a steep fall in the government’s popularity over the last few months after gunmen calling for a new government captured a police station in Yerevan, triggering a two week stand- off with security forces in which three policemen died.

Mr Karapetyan is a former mayor of Yerevan and ex-chief executive of ArmRosGazprom, the Armenian subsidiary of Russia’s Gazprom. His brother is Samvel Karapetyan, owner of Tashir Group, a Russian real estate holding company that bought the electricity distributor, Electricity Networks of Armenia (ENA), last year from Russia’s Inter RAO.

Billionaire Samvel Karapetyan effectively helped out the Armenian government who needed to find a buyer for ENA quickly after Inter RAO said it wanted to sell up after a botched attempt to raise electricity prices had triggered street demonstrations.

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(News report from Issue No. 296, published on Sept. 16 2016)

Ministers resign in Georgia

SEPT. 14 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Two ministers linked to the ruling Georgian Dream party resigned ahead of the October election to comply with eligibility requirements. Otar Danelia, minister of agriculture, and Kakha Kaladze, minister of energy, resigned to run as high-profile candidates in the Georgian Dream ranks. Under Georgia’s election rules, ministers have to resign to run.

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(News report from Issue No. 296, published on Sept. 16 2016)

Georgia’s President appoints new judges

SEPT. 10 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Georgia’s President Giorgi Margvelashvili named Irina Imerlishvili, secretary of the National Security Council, and Giorgi Kverenchkhiladze, former parliamentary secretary of the President, as new judges at the Constitutional Court. Soon after the upcoming election, Parliament and the Supreme Court are also due to nominate two new judges, which could significantly change the makeup of the 9- seat Court.

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(News report from Issue No. 296, published on Sept. 16 2016)

Kazakhstan creates new ministry

SEPT. 13 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – A presidential decree connected to the recent reshuffle in the Kazakh government established the ministry of religious affairs and civil society, headed by Nurlan Yermekbayev. Mr Yermekbayev, former aide to the president and secretary of the Security Council, pledged to foster inter-religious dialogue. Analysts have criticised the creation of the new ministry as a new instrument to control society.

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(News report from Issue No. 296, published on Sept. 16 2016)