What to expect from the Kazakh presidential race

Yesterday it was reported that three people have so far been approved as candidates in the early presidential elections in Kazakhstan - current President Nursultan Nazarbayev, a member of the Central Committee of the Communist People's Party Turgun Syzdykov and the Chairman of the Labor Unions Federation Abelgazi Kusainov.

If it is more or less clear how the first candidate will act during the race, the actions of the other two candidates are a mystery.

Political analysts Eduard Poletayev, Yulia Yakusheva, Vladimir Lepekhin and Andrey Grozin have expressed their opinions about the candidates in an interview with Vestnik Kavkaza.

According to the editor-in-chief of Mir Yevrazii magazine, Eduard Poletayev, "Turgun Syzdykov and Abelgazi Kusainov will use mainly social rhetoric in the campaign."

The deputy executive director of the North-South Political Science Center, Julia Yakusheva, in her turn, noted that it is difficult to make predictions, because today it is not clear what the rivals of Nursultan Nazarbayev will offer to the voters. "Syzdykov has not even declared his personal program. In the few interviews that he gave as a candidate, very vague wordings were voiced. As for Kusainov, he does not represent any political force, and he needs to put forward some relevant program to get a more significant percentage. I doubt that this program will be provided in the form which could bring the candidate any votes," she said.

While characterizing Syzdykov and Kusainov, the director of the EurAsEC Institute, Vladimir Lepekhin, drew attention to the fact that "these candidates and their electorate are similar." "They seem to stretch the votes of those voters who might be opposed to the president of Kazakhstan," he said. "But if they will gain too little and their possible results will not be very serious, it is possible that one of them will retract their candidacy and the other candidate will score 3-4%," he suggested.

However, according to the head of the Central Asia Department of the CIS Institute, Andrei Grozin, it may be the only intrigue of this race. "Most people will vote for stability, which they know, which they entirely associate with the current president. It will be just a referendum on maintaining the stability of the exchange rate in the economy, foreign policy, the internal policy, which is entirely bound up with the current head of the country in the mass consciousness of Kazakhstan," the analyst said.