The protests in Kazakhstan are going on for the fourth day in a row. On January 2, residents of Zhanaozen and Aktau went out to protest against the double rise in the price of liquefied petroleum gas to 120 tenge (0.27 dollars) per litre. The protesters demanded to decrease the price to the previous one.
According to the Ministry of Energy, this surge in price was explained by the switch to electronic trading of liquefied petroleum gas. However, this statement convinced neither protesters nor experts. According to public figure Mukhtar Taizhan, although electronic trading sounds nice and tradeable, in fact only one platform was set up for gas purchase and sale. In other words, an artificial monopolist was created administratively.
“What does the newly created monopolist “exchange” do? Traders pay a huge exchange charge; only particular brokers may trade and they take big fees for brokerage services. After all, these artificial mediators levelled up prices for 30 and more per cent because of their greed and monopolistic position,” he said.
Serik Baktybaiuly is a resident of Zhanaozen and one of protesters who was streaming the protests until the internet was shut down. He worries that the increase in gas prices will automatically affect food prices.
“The authorities always fob us off with promises. We produce gas ourselves, but it keeps on getting more expensive every year. They should provide us with gas first rather than supply it to Russia. Our prices and salaries are inconsistent. Gas price should not exceed 50 tenge (0.11 dollars),” he said.
The following day, the government of Kazakhstan, by order of President Kasym-Zhomart Tokayev, announced the creation of the commission to review socioeconomic situation in Mangistau region and promised to implement a package of measure to regulate the price of liquefied petroleum gas.
And on January 5, the president signed the decree on resignation of the government. The head of the cabinet of ministers, Askar Mamin, was replaced by a.i. Alikhan Smailov. Despite this, the protests took hold of the country.
Local protests became nationwide on the third day. Protest actions took place in the capital city of Nur-Sultan, Almaty, Karaganda, Uralsk, Taldykorgan, Kyzylorda, Shymkent. At some cities, crowds chanted “Shal, ket” (from Kazakh, “Old man, get away”) meaning the ex-president of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev. At some cities, monuments of the ex-president were demolished.
Monument of Nursultan Nazarbayev in Taldykorgan. Photo: S. Duisenov
In Almaty, the protesters seized firearms from the captured military transport and police armoury. Internet was shut down all over the county, some TV channels went off air for some time. The military and armoured vehicles were taken to the streets of Almaty. They are going to be deployed across Kazakhstan today.
On the night of January 6, major shopping malls and banks were robbed in the city.
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The protesters captured the airport of Almaty and crushed the domestic terminal and Duty Free. Earlier, the city akimat was captured and set on fire. The amount of the damage caused is unknown yet.
According to the January 5 data, 8 police officers and national guardsmen died as a result of clashes in the country. 317 law enforcement officers were wounded in Kazakhstan. in Almaty, over 500 civilians, including women and old men, were manhandled, 120 cars were burnt down, nearly 400 stores, cafés and offices were damaged. According to the interior ministry, nearly 200 protesters were detained.
On January 6, the confrontation in Almaty is still in progress with some gunfights.
Amid the protests, the head of the state Kasym-Zhomart Tokayev addressed the people via state TV channels several times. He said he would not leave the country and now he is the head of the Security Council and would be acting severely. Earlier, this post was occupied by the first president of Kazakhstan, Nursultan Nazarbayev.
In the evening of January 5, the emergency rule was imposed on the country. It provides for the curfew from 7.00 to 23.00, ban on public events and strikes, ban on sales of weapons, munitions and alcohol, as well as withdrawal of arms and munitions from people and reinforced control of high-security objects.
Fell short of expectations
According to Kazakhstan-based political analyst Dosym Satpayev, current protests are the continuation of protests that took place in 2019 before the presidential election after the resignation of Nursultan Nazarbayev. And current slogans reflect those unfulfilled expectation.
“Many people thought that once Tokayev comes to power something can change. For example, they thought that the parliamentary elections would be carried out under a new system, but they were carried out under the same old system. Elections to maslikhats were held under control of akims. Elections of rural akims, which were advertised so much, turned to be a hoax. All we see is that Tokayev, for all these years of his presidency, has failed to fulfil all his promises in terms of political reforms,” Satpayev said.
According to him, people who were hoping for the changes in 2019, were disappointed and understood that the gas issue was not purely economical, but related to the existing oligarchic economy in the country, which, in turn, is directly related to the existing authoritarian state administration.
“In fact, a lot of various factors overlap with these protests: the fear for the future, fear for children, discontent with their current status, disappointment with unfulfilled promises. People are tired of waiting for what was promised to them 30 years ago,” the political analyst said.
According to Mukhtar Taizhan, the authorities and oligarchs, whose interests were supported ignorantly by the government, are to blame in the current events. He said that the investigative authorities need to find out who suggested creating the electronic platform for selling liquefied gas.
“The reasons for this conflict are the lack and rejecting economic and political reforms, which needed to be launched two years ago, right after the December 2019 meeting of the National Council of Public Trust. The reformative pace was lost and then the pandemic began. Prime minister Mamin who was unable to step down from the oligarchic influence should have been replaced at least one year or six months ago,” Taizhan said.
He is confident that the cabinet of ministers, which continues to perform their functions until the new one is appointed, should resign in whole. Taizhan offers to hold President Tokayev partly liable for the lack of control over enforcement of his orders.
“He should have called the ministers, and, first, the prime minister, to task for execution of presidential reforms. Will the new prime minister Smailov be able to execute the necessary reforms? I don’t know. It depends on whether he can get rid of the oligarchic influence. If he can, it would be good. Otherwise, we will have such conflicts in the future,” he said.
Help from CSTO
Political analyst Amirzhan Kosanov said that further development of the situation will depend on the behaviour of the authorities.
“If they do not pursue peaceful talks, do not respect the opinion of ordinary citizens, and make them all violators and looters, then we will have a reverse effect. Only the launch of sweeping economic and political reforms will reduce tensions and take the country out of this political crisis,” he said.
On January 5, President Kasym-Zhomart Tokayev called the events in Kazakhstan a terrorist attack and asked the CSTO for help.
“In fact, this is not the threat, this is the disruption of the integrity of the state and, most importantly, the attack against our citizens who ask me as the head of the state to help them immediately. […] Therefore, I think it is absolutely appropriate and timely to refer to the partners in CSTO,” Tokayev said.
The collective security council of the CSTO answered positively to the request of the Kazakhstan authorities. The prime minister of Armenia, Nikol Pashinyan, wrote about it in his Facebook account. According to him, collective peacekeeping forces will be moved to Kazakhstan “for a limited period in order to stabilise and normalise the situation in the country.”
Kazakhstan-based experts think that the authorities seeking help in CSTO was a big political mistake. According to them, it can turn the protests into interethnic clashes and national liberation movement.
While the country is in chaos, rich Kazakhstanis began to leave the country.
According to the Flightradar service, nearly ten private jets left Nur-Sultan and Almaty for Europe in recent days. They belong to various businessmen of Kazakhstan.