What’s in Kazakhstan’s Constitutional Referendum? – The Diplomat

On June 5, Kazakhs will vote on a package deal of reforms meant to transform the country from a super-presidential system to a “presidential system with a robust parliament.”

Six months after Kazakhstan’s President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev called protesters terrorists and requested assist from the Russian-backed Collective Safety Treaty Organization to quell mass unrest, citizens will take part in a referendum on constitutional reforms. 

The vote will take place on June 5, just one month after the proposed reforms had been launched. The reform package addresses 33 separate articles – about one third of the full constitutional articles – and was developed by a working group that Tokayev established in March. The reforms are stated to rework Kazakhstan from a super-presidential system to a “presidential system with a strong parliament,” per Tokayev’s state of the union address on March 16.

An excellent-presidential system is one the place parliaments and courts are only nominally independent, and the president and their administration have almost unlimited control over political decision-making. Kazakhstan’s first step to a super-presidential system was the adoption of a brand new structure in 1995 that was pushed by Nursultan Nazarbayev after dissolving an uncooperative parliament. Nazarbayev further consolidated his personal powers with constitutional amendments in 1998, 2007, and 2011.

Nazarbayev started to loosen the president’s management with constitutional amendments in 2017 that barely redistributed presidential powers to other branches of presidency and opened the trail for the election of local representatives, at least on the village stage. However, Nazarbayev slyly maintained his personal control over Kazakhstan’s politics by together with provisions that protected him as “elbasy,” or chief of the nation.

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The proposed constitutional reforms strip the structure of mentions of elbasy and the First President of the Republic, which some see as a continued sign of the Nazarbayev household’s fall from grace. 

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In addition to sidelining Nazarbayev, several proposed provisions would slightly limit the facility of the president. The president shouldn't be a member of a political occasion, which member of the working group Sara Idrysheva called “the bravest step of our esteemed president.” In anticipation of this modification, Tokayev stepped down as chairman of the Amanat get together – a rebranded version of Nazarbayev’s ruling Nur Otan social gathering – on April 26. Additionally, the president can now not override the acts of akims of oblasts, main cities, or the capital and shut members of the family of the president cannot hold political posts.

A number of proposed measures give parliament extra energy vis-a-vis the president. Kazakhstan’s parliament will stay bicameral, however the distribution of energy between the higher and lower houses will shift considerably. The Senate will not have the facility to make new legal guidelines, and instead will simply approve or reject laws passed by the Mazhilis. Moreover, the method for choosing deputies to both houses will change. 

First, the Mazhilis can be reduced to 98 deputies, following the abolition of 9 seats appointed by the Assembly of the Peoples of Kazakhstan. These seats will likely be transferred to the Senate, and the Meeting of the Peoples will now only get to appoint 5 deputies. The variety of deputies appointed by the president might be reduced from 15 to 10.

Second, Mazhilis deputies will probably be elected according to a mixed system. Seventy percent of Mazhilis deputies can be chosen by proportional elections, and 30 % will be immediately elected.

The one proposed modifications to the judicial system relate to the reestablishment of the Constitutional Court docket. Kazakhstan had a Constitutional Court docket until the adoption of the 1995 structure, which instituted a weaker constitutional council. The president nonetheless maintains a strong influence over the Constitutional Court’s makeup, however, with the flexibility to pick the court’s chairman and four of the judges; parliament chooses the other three.

Tokayev has emphasised the importance of local governance, marked by the first-ever direct election of village akims and plans to introduce three new oblasts that can deliver government our bodies closer to the populations they signify. Maybe essentially the most disappointing aspect of proposed reforms is the dearth of serious motion on native representation for residents of Kazakhstan’s largest cities. If the referendum passes, Kazakhstanis will get to vote for akims of oblasts, main cities, and the capital – nevertheless, the candidates can have been selected by the president. The precise to elect local leadership has been one of the vital constant demands from Almaty residents, and this attempt to create alternative is finally cosmetic.

The proposed reforms are essential steps towards real consultant authorities in Kazakhstan; nevertheless, they do not necessarily represent ahead movement. Most of the amendments are simply reinstating mechanisms of checks on presidential energy that previously existed, slightly than materially altering the relationship between state and society, as Tokayev claims.