Kazakhstan yesterday voted on a constitutional reform promoted by Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev as a step toward liberalizing the tightly-run oil-rich nation, although it would still leave key powers in his hands.
The reform is likely to give the 69-year-old Tokayev the political capital he needs to run for a second term in the Central Asian country, which is closely allied with Russia, this time without the backing of his former patron and predecessor, Nursultan Nazarbayev.
Although in power since 2019, following Nazarbayev’s abrupt resignation after three decades in power, Tokayev only this year fully emerged as an independent figure after subverting an attempted coup in January, and removing Nazarbayev and his relatives from key positions in the Kazakh government.
Photo: Reuters
Aside from moves to decentralize decisionmaking and allow greater representation of various groups in parliament, the reform would also strip Nazarbayev of his “national leader” status, which granted him lifetime privileges.
Tokayev has described the proposed changes as a move from a “superpresidential” system to a presidential republic with a strong parliament.
Although critics say the reform is cosmetic, it does mark a reversal from a decades-long trend toward strengthening presidential powers.
“We are ... laying the foundation for the Second Republic,” Tokayev said, addressing the nation on the eve of the vote.
Analysts say the move is in part a response to January’s unrest, which started as a protest against a fuel price increase and evolved into a broad display of public discontent with a system that concentrates power and wealth in the hands of a few.
Tokayev has also called for higher taxes on the lucrative extractive industries and high-income individuals, saying social justice would be the cornerstone of a new social contract.
Addressing domestic policy concerns would free up the career diplomat’s hands to deal with unprecedented external turbulence, he said.
Caught between the West, which has invested hundreds of billions of dollars into its oil fields and mines, and major economic and security partner Russia, Kazakhstan is trying to navigate a way through the Ukrainian crisis without angering either side.
AFGHAN CHILD: A court battle is ongoing over if the toddler can stay with Joshua Mast and his wife, who wanted ‘life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness’ for her Major Joshua Mast, a US Marine whose adoption of an Afghan war orphan has spurred a years-long legal battle, is to remain on active duty after a three-member panel of Marines on Tuesday found that while he acted in a way unbecoming of an officer to bring home the baby girl, it did not warrant his separation from the military. Lawyers for the Marine Corps argued that Mast abused his position, disregarded orders of his superiors, mishandled classified information and improperly used a government computer in his fight over the child who was found orphaned on the battlefield in rural Afghanistan
NEW STORM: investigators dubbed the attacks on US telecoms ‘Salt Typhoon,’ after authorities earlier this year disrupted China’s ‘Flax Typhoon’ hacking group Chinese hackers accessed the networks of US broadband providers and obtained information from systems that the federal government uses for court-authorized wiretapping, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported on Saturday. The networks of Verizon Communications, AT&T and Lumen Technologies, along with other telecoms, were breached by the recently discovered intrusion, the newspaper said, citing people familiar with the matter. The hackers might have held access for months to network infrastructure used by the companies to cooperate with court-authorized US requests for communications data, the report said. The hackers had also accessed other tranches of Internet traffic, it said. The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs
EYEING THE US ELECTION: Analysts say that Pyongyang would likely leverage its enlarged nuclear arsenal for concessions after a new US administration is inaugurated North Korean leader Kim Jong-un warned again that he could use nuclear weapons in potential conflicts with South Korea and the US, as he accused them of provoking North Korea and raising animosities on the Korean Peninsula, state media reported yesterday. Kim has issued threats to use nuclear weapons pre-emptively numerous times, but his latest warning came as experts said that North Korea could ramp up hostilities ahead of next month’s US presidential election. In a Monday speech at a university named after him, the Kim Jong-un National Defense University, he said that North Korea “will without hesitation use all its attack
STOPOVERS: As organized crime groups in Asia and the Americas move drugs via places such as Tonga, methamphetamine use has reached levels called ‘epidemic’ A surge of drugs is engulfing the South Pacific as cartels and triads use far-flung island nations to channel narcotics across the globe, top police and UN officials told reporters. Pacific island nations such as Fiji and Tonga sit at the crossroads of largely unpatrolled ocean trafficking routes used to shift cocaine from Latin America, and methamphetamine and opioids from Asia. This illicit cargo is increasingly spilling over into local hands, feeding drug addiction in communities where serious crime had been rare. “We’re a victim of our geographical location. An ideal transit point for vessels crossing the Pacific,” Tonga Police Commissioner Shane McLennan
RSS