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

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

Six months after Kazakhstan’s President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev known as protesters terrorists and requested support from the Russian-backed Collective Security Treaty Organization to quell mass unrest, citizens will participate in a referendum on constitutional reforms. 

The vote will happen on June 5, just one month after the proposed reforms were released. 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 powerful parliament,” per Tokayev’s state of the union deal with on March 16.

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

Nazarbayev began to loosen the president’s control with constitutional amendments in 2017 that slightly redistributed presidential powers to different branches of government and opened the trail for the election of local representatives, not less than at the village level. However, Nazarbayev slyly maintained his private management over Kazakhstan’s politics by including provisions that protected him as “elbasy,” or leader 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 signal of the Nazarbayev household’s fall from grace. 

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In addition to sidelining Nazarbayev, a number of proposed provisions would barely prohibit the power of the president. The president should not be a member of a political social gathering, which member of the working group Sara Idrysheva known as “the bravest step of our esteemed president.” In anticipation of this modification, Tokayev stepped down as chairman of the Amanat celebration – a rebranded version of Nazarbayev’s ruling Nur Otan celebration – on April 26. Moreover, the president can not override the acts of akims of oblasts, main cities, or the capital and shut relations of the president cannot maintain political posts.

Several proposed measures give parliament extra power vis-a-vis the president. Kazakhstan’s parliament will remain bicameral, however the distribution of energy between the higher and decrease houses will shift somewhat. The Senate will no longer have the ability to make new laws, and as a substitute will just approve or reject legal guidelines passed by the Mazhilis. Moreover, the process for selecting deputies to both homes will change. 

First, the Mazhilis will likely be lowered to 98 deputies, following the abolition of nine seats appointed by the Meeting of the Peoples of Kazakhstan. Those seats will be transferred to the Senate, and the Assembly of the Peoples will now solely get to nominate five deputies. The number of deputies appointed by the president will probably be reduced from 15 to 10.

Second, Mazhilis deputies will be elected in keeping with a combined system. Seventy p.c of Mazhilis deputies might be chosen by proportional elections, and 30 % shall be immediately elected.

The one proposed changes to the judicial system relate to the reestablishment of the Constitutional Court. Kazakhstan had a Constitutional Courtroom till the adoption of the 1995 constitution, which instituted a weaker constitutional council. The president still maintains a robust affect over the Constitutional Courtroom’s make-up, however, with the ability to pick the courtroom’s chairman and 4 of the judges; parliament chooses the opposite three.

Tokayev has emphasized the importance of local governance, marked by the first-ever direct election of village akims and plans to introduce three new oblasts that may deliver government our bodies closer to the populations they signify. Maybe the most disappointing aspect of proposed reforms is the shortage of serious movement on local illustration 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 – however, the candidates may have been selected by the president. The proper to elect native management has been one of the most consistent calls for from Almaty residents, and this attempt to create selection is ultimately beauty.

The proposed reforms are vital steps toward actual consultant government in Kazakhstan; however, they do not essentially constitute ahead motion. Lots of the amendments are merely reinstating mechanisms of checks on presidential energy that previously existed, somewhat than materially altering the relationship between state and society, as Tokayev claims.