More information about Kazakhstan government in Kazakhstan.
Current Kazakhstan President is Nursultan Abish-uly Nazarbayev.
Elections in December 2005 returned Mr. Nazarbayev for a further seven-year term with over 90% of the votes. The opposition protested that the ballot had been rigged and OSCE observers declared it to have been seriously flawed.
Nursultan Nazarbayev said the election had been fair and showed that Kazakhstan people wanted evolution, not revolution.
Born in 1940, Nursultan Nazarbayev came to power in 1989 as the first secretary of the Communist Party of Kazakhstan and was elected president the following year. He was re-elected after the break-up of the Soviet Union in 1991.
Nursultan Nazarbayev’s supporters credit him with managing to preserve inter-ethnic accord and stability during the reform years. Nursultan Nazarbayev has concentrated extensive powers in his own hands and is accused by the opposition of suppressing dissent. Although Nursultan Nazarbayev says he advocates democracy as a long-term goal, he also warns that stability could be at risk if change is too swift.
The referendum in 1995 extended his term of office and in 1999 Nursultan Nazarbayev was again elected president in elections from which his main rival was barred from standing on a technicality.
In 2000 Nursultan Nazarbayev saw through legislation granting him powers for life even when he does leave office - he has a permanent seat on the defense council and a role as head of the people’s assembly, which unites members of different ethnic groups in Kazakhstan.
Nursultan Nazarbayev’s party, Otan, retained a comfortable majority in the lower house of Kazakhstan parliament in elections in 2004 and a large number of seats went to other parties regarded as loyal to the president, giving him tight control. Western observers said that Kazakhstan elections had failed to meet international standards.
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