MAY 26 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakhstan’s Parliament ratified an agreement to receive a $1b loan from the World Bank’s International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, a cash injection that the government will use to pay for expenses in 2016. Kazakhstan’s finance ministry and the IBRD had agreed on the loan on May 11.
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(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)
MAY 24 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Christine Lagarde, managing director of the IMF, said that Kazakhstan has to embark on a series of institutional reforms and deepen regional integration to face the challenges posed by sustained low oil prices. Ms Lagarde spoke from Astana, where she met President Nursultan Nazarbayev and senior government officials. Ms Lagarde also praised the ditching of the tenge’s US dollar peg last year.
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(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)
MAY 25 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakhstan’s energy minister Kanat Bozumbayev said that investment into the expansion of Tengizchevroil, the Chevron-led consortium exploiting the Tengiz oilfield in the west of the country, will be delayed until next year. Mr Bozumbayev said that costs for the so-called Future Growth Project would be $37b, up from an earlier estimate of $34b. The project has been delayed because of the low oil prices.
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(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)
MAY 20 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Bolat Nazarbayev, brother of Kazakhstan’s President Nursultan Nazarbayev, bought a 50% stake in the Ukrainian lender Eurobank. The remaining 50% of the bank is indirectly owned by Ukrainian financier Vadim Pushkarev. In 2014, Bolat Nazarbayev bought a 7.83% stake in Kazakhstan’s Bank RBK.
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(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)
MAY 20 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Journalists at Kazinform, the Kazakh government’s media outlet, said they would go on a strike on May 21 because of wage arrears, but later called it off. Importantly, strikes at Kazinform are rare. The last recorded strike was in 2010. May 21 was a sensitive date as a popular protest against changes to the land code was planned on the same day. The government stepped in and met the demands of Kazinform journalists.
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(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)
MAY 26 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — The EBRD has loaned around €294m ($328m) to KazTransGas, Kazakhstan’s state-owned gas distributor, to finance the modernisation of a gas storage facility and a distribution network. This is the first time that the EBRD has invested into KazTransGas projects. Modernisation at the Bozoi gas storage facility, near the Aral Sea, will increase its capacity by 1.5 times to 4b cubic metres.
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(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)
ALMATY, MAY 23 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — A court in Almaty sentenced Guzyal Baidalinova, owner and editor of the Nakanune.kz website which is critical of the Kazakh government, to 1-1⁄2 years in jail for libel against Kazkommertsbank.
Baidalinova’s supporters said that the charges against her are politically motivated and show that the authorities in Kazakhstan have little regard for freedom of the press. In a separate case, charges against Seitkazy Matayev, head of the Journalists Union and a former press chief for President Nursultan Nazarbayev were reduced from embezzlement and tax evasion to abuse of trust. He has denied the charges.
The authorities in Kazakhstan have been cracking down on journalists as an economic downturn worsens and ordinary Kazakhs start become increasingly frustrated with their plight.
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(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)
MAY 17 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Former Kazakh minister of economy Yerbolat Dossayev took the post of chairman of Baiterek, a state-owned holding that manages several financial vehicles. This is effectively a job swap. Mr Dossayev replaces Kuandyk Bishimbayev at Baiterek. Earlier this month Mr Bishimbayev was made the minister of economy. Mr Dossayev resigned as economy minister after protests over planned changes to the land code spread across the country earlier this month.
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(News report from Issue No. 281, published on May 20 2016)
MAY 19 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kazakhstan’s GDP shrank by 0.2% in the first quarter of 2016, the first dip in seven years, according to the Statistics Committee. Trade, telecoms, and industrial production slowed significantly. Analysts at Halyk Finance forecast that Kazakhstan’s GDP will grow by just 0.2% this year, the lowest growth since the 2008 Global Financial Crisis. Kazakhstan, like the rest of the region, is struggling to deal with the knock on effects of a recession in Russia and collapse in oil prices.
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(News report from Issue No. 281, published on May 20 2016)
MAY 17 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – A Kazakh court ordered the seizure of assets at Munai Service Aktobe, a small oil service company in north- western Kazakhstan, after it failed to pay 17.3m tenge ($52,000) in wage arrears. The Aktobe administration said that there are several companies in the oil and gas sector whose wage arrears are “chronic”. In 2011, protests by oil workers in Western Kazakhstan triggered clashes that killed at least a dozen people. With increasing frequency, reports are emerging from Kazakhstan that companies are failing to pay their workers on time.
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(News report from Issue No. 281, published on May 20 2016)