The Central Electoral Commission (CEC) of Kazakhstan has approved the schedule for holding early parliamentary elections on March 20th and will be combined with the elections of deputies to maslikhats (local representative bodies), the chairman of the Central Electoral Commission, Kuandyk Turgankulov, stated.
"The election campaign will consist of three key stages," he reported. According to the head of the CEC, "the nomination of candidates for the elections to the Majilis (lower chamber) of the parliament, elected on party lists, begins after the decision to hold elections and will last until February 8th 2016, from the Assembly of the People of Kazakhstan (AKP) till February 29th."
Turgankulov explained that the right of nomination belongs to registered political parties, and candidates from the AKP are nominated by the Assembly Council. "The candidates are nominated to maslikhats by republican and local public associations, their structural divisions and citizens through self-nomination," he informed, adding that "this process will continue until February 19th."
The second stage of the campaign, the registration of candidates on party lists, will be carried out by the CEC until February 19th, candidates from the AKP until March 5th, maslikhats until February 29th.
The third stage, the pre-election campaign of political parties, kicks off on February 20th and will last until 00.00 March 19th. "The pre-election campaign of candidates for Majilis' deputies, elected by the AKP, will be held from March 6th to 19th, maslikhats – from February 24th to March 18th," the head of the CEC said.
Turgankulov said that, considering the combination of elections on the day of voting, a majority of voters will recieve three ballots – one to vote for a political party, a second – for a candidate for deputy of the regional maslikhats, or the maslikhats of Astana and Almaty, and a third – for the candidate of the district or city maslikhat. In Astana and Almaty, where there are no district maslikhats, voters will receive two ballots, TASS notes.
The editor-in-chief of the 'World of Eurasia' magazine, Eduard Poletayev, stated in an interview with a correspondent of Vestnik Kavkaza that there are several reasons for the decision to hold early parliamentary elections in Kazakhstan.
"The main reason is that such an initiative has appeared in the walls of the parliament itself, which basically fulfilled everything in 2015 at an accelerated pace, it adopted several dozen laws. It was supported by a sufficiently large number of members of the public, various organizations, political parties, experts made many comments about it," he said.
This decision also has an economic background. "Right now, prices for basic export commodities of Kazakhstan are dropping, the tenge is devalued against the dollar. At the same time, there are quite ambitious plans on the part of Astana. There is the fulfillment of the so-called Plan of the Nation, specific steps, reforms that are included in it. Basically, President Nursultan Nazarbayev himself was a candidate under this plan last year, when there were presidential elections in the Republic of Kazakhstan. This document was the basis of his election program. The economic situation today is such that there is a need for new people to solve fairly serious problems," the expert noted.
