Askar DARIMBET
ALMATY, August 17
(THE GLOBE)
“On August 11 the party “Political alliance of women’s organisations of Kazakhstan” received a temporary registration certificate. As for the moment of the registration, more than 3.5 thousand people were members of the party,” the chairman of the party announced on Wednesday in Almaty.
According to Raushan Sarsenbaeva, the constitutive conference was held on June 21. Leaders of women’s non-governmental, public organisations and private companies formed the initiative group on establishment of the party. 3 thousand signatures necessary to be registered were collected for a week.
At the present time, in her opinion, it is required to enter a higher level (in comparison with just a public organisation) to lobby their own interests, as well as to change the status of Kazakhstan women.
This means to take some social measures, which require new economic approaches not only to preparation, but to realisation of social programs on reduction of poverty scales, on unemployment, healthcare, protection of maternity and childhood, on education. The aim of these programs is to raise the standard of life of the Kazakhstan population. Social programs are the guarantee of stability of our society, Mrs. Sarsenbaeva believes.
The alliance is interested in nomination of women to deputies of the Parliament and to maslikhats of all levels. However, they receive the information that in regions, namely in Kokshetav, women who are trying to pass the registration, face many difficulties. The party will support these women.
“As women’s problem are being transformed to problems for women, we have to settle these problems ourselves. Political equality is democratically interpreted only verbally, in fact, as far as the manpower market and the policy are concerned, women have to let men prevail, being satisfied with auxiliary spheres of activity,” the President of ASaP, who is the deputy of the chairman of the party, stated.
Bakhytzhamal Bekturganova emphasised that the new party, which for the first time revealed itself in Kazakhstan, was supposed to express an opinion of a women part of the republican population, their families and relatives.
The alliance is going to establish a political dialogue between the state, women’s organisations, and the community regarding all key problems concerning protection and realisation of the rights and freedoms of women.
The party “Political Alliance of women’s organisations of Kazakhstan” is based on social-democratic principles, i.e. a trial to adjust the economic appropriateness and social justness.
According to Mrs. Bekturganova, the alliance is not eager to come to the power, as its task is to create a mechanism of the public control for decisions taken by the authorities. The openness of the alliance for co-operation with all parties and movements of reformation platform was also emphasised. At the present time, the deputy of the chairman believes, there are mainly appointed women in the political Olympus. When elected heads enter the authorities, the situation will change, as in this case only women will be responsible before the electorate. The party wishes women were not less than 30% of the legislative and executive branches of the power.
“However, we do not share the positions of the radical feminism. At the same time, when women’s opinion is not taken into consideration while taking decisions, this increased the difference between what they want to have and what they actually receive from the government. That is why it is necessary to democratise the economy to guarantee the equal access of all groups and strata of the society to the market economy,” Bakhytzhamal Bekturganova stated.
According to Mrs. Bekturganova, the experience and analysis of the protection of women’s rights shows that the legislation has a trend to worsen women’s condition. The establishment of the women’s party is the response of the Kazakhstan women to the call of the current moment and the proof of the growth of women’s political self-consciousness.
According to the leaders of the women’s party, it is planned to hold the first congress of the alliance in August.
ASaP
Almaty, August 18
(Specially for THE GLOBE)
The Almaty Association of Sociologists and Politologists (ASaP) has sent an official inquiry to the chairman of the Central Election Commission Mrs. Z. Balieva requesting to give a permission for a poll of electors on the day of the election directly at the election districts right after the voting.
The representative office of OSCE in Kazakhstan supported the initiative of ASaP and is going to control the progress of this issue in the Central Election Commission.
In case of a positive resolution by the Central Election Commission, ASaP will conduct the poll of electors in ‘operative time’ regime directly at the election districts right after the voting in 15 towns of the republic on the day of the election to the Parliament. Poll according to the method “Exit Poll” is widely accepted in western democratic countries during elections.
As the information from election districts is available, the statistic model of “Exit Poll” will allow ASaP to present an accurate independent prognosis of the results of the election through the mass media.
The sociological “Exit Poll” by ASaP will be a test of the Central Election Commission by democracy and objectivity while calculating electorate’s votes.
In case of an official rejection by the Central Election Commission, ASaP will poll electors in their houses and outside the territory of election districts in the projected 15 towns.
ALMATY, August 18
(THE GLOBE)
On Wednesday the ex-candidate to the President post Gani Kasymov received the certificate of a candidate to the Mazhilis from the Auezov election circuit of Almaty No. 63. The candidate explained his choice that this circuit was one of the most difficult ones, and there were a lot of different problems to be settled.
“I took the decision to be balloted, as I realise the serious responsibility for the present condition of the country,” Gani Kasymov announced at the meeting with journalists.
According to Mr. Kasymov, now it is required to strive for approval of new constitutional laws, which will significantly widen the authority of the Mazhilis. The Parliament, first of all, is to be able to control the country’s budget, its working out and realisation.
“Without agreement with the Parliament, neither the Finance Ministry nor National Bank have the right to determine the principal directions of the financial-monetary policy and take decisions influencing interests and prosperity of the nation,” Mr. Kasymov emphasised.
In his opinion, the governments cannot be allowed to function without any control, as the government is to work according to the program ratified by the Parliament.
The candidate to deputies said that he would initiate measures to touch the crime legislation to protect the population from bandits, encroachments on private life and property.
Gani Kasymov will nominate his candidature himself. Existing parties, according to him, are mainly amorphous and present only their leaders, who came to achieve some aims, namely to enter into the Parliament.
Erkanat ABENI
Almaty, August 17
(THE GLOBE)
“The list of candidates to the Mazhilis will be completely determined on August 23 in Aktobe at the 2nd congress of the Civil Party of Kazakhstan,” the leader of the party announced on August 17 in Almaty.
According to Azat Peruashev, about 30 to 40 candidates will be nominated. He himself is not going to be balloted, as he believes that it will be difficult to combine an effective work in the Central Committee with the work in the Parliament.
At the present time CPK is going to nominate 395 candidates to the next election to the regional, town and local maslikhats. Including 134 candidates to the regional maslikhats, almost a half of the total number of candidates — to the town maslikhats, and only a small number of candidates — to district maslikhats. Mr. Peruashev explained this fact that the Civil Party was first of all is an industrial party of the developed regions. The deputy from CPK of the present composition of the Mazhilis, Victor Kreshnin announced that the pre-election alliance had been already formed. The Federation of Kazakhstan trade unions became a political partner of CPK. Beside the common interests, the parties agreed to finance jointly the pre-election campaigns of their candidates.
Azat Peruashev added that apart from the Federation of trade unions, CPK was not going to form a pre-election block with any party, but any pre-election block would be established, only if their alliances completely agreed to accept the program of the Civil Party.
For the last several months CPK conducted some significant charitable events in children’s homes and hospital. Mr. Peruashev believes that this gives them the right to hope for a support of the population.
“As the number of our members is gradually growing, and at the present time is already more than 50 thousand persons, we are going to take approximately 10 to 12 sits in the Mazhilis,” the leader of the Civil Party stated.
ALMATY, August, 17
(THE GLOBE)
“To the next election to the Mazhilis of RK our movement nominates 8 candidates,” the chairman of the Youth Union of Kazakhstan announced on Wednesday in Almaty.
According to Yesenzhol Aliyarov, the movement decided to establish the republican youth’s headquarter to support nominated candidates who will be balloted in one-mandate districts.
“People who are able to protect interests of the young generation of our country are to be elected to the new Parliament,” the chairman of the Youth’s union emphasised.
However, many experts think that the majority of the youth even does not know about this union. And this proves that the youth will hardly take part in the election. This minimises its chances for a successful election.
Despite experts’ prognosis, members of the Youth’s union of Kazakhstan are optimistic enough.
“We will do our best for our candidates to win,” Yesenzhol Aliyarov stated.
By Paul Goble
Washington, 16 August
(RFE/RL)
Election campaigns can unsettle a country’s economy not only because they raise the specter of policy changes but also because they encourage incumbents to adopt policies to generate short-term electoral support without regard for their longer-term economic consequences.
That pattern holds even in long-established democratic countries, but as recent developments in Kazakhstan, the Russian Federation, and Ukraine show, it can be especially severe in post-communist countries whose economies are shaky and whose political systems are far from fully institutionalized.
In Kazakhstan earlier this year, President Nursultan Nazarbayev introduced a number of measures just prior to the elections intended to stabilize his country’s economic situation and thus win him additional support at the polls. But as many observers noted at the time, whatever short-term political benefits these measures might bring would be swamped by their impact on the economy over the longer haul.
Indeed, both foreign and domestic firms showed that they understood that possibility. During the campaign, they reduced their investments in Kazakhstan. And since the election, they have cut back still further as Nazarbayev’s campaign-driven measures are proving ever more counterproductive economically.
More recently in the Russian Federation, President Boris Yeltsin has sought to introduce policies that will generate at least some support for him and thus prevent the defeat of his supporters in the December 1999 elections and a loss by those who might continue his approach in the presidential poll next summer. But because of some specific features of the Russian landscape, the linkage of elections and the economy there have taken on a somewhat different form.
On the one hand, Yeltsin has made a series of new concessions to the business oligarchy that helped gain him reelection last time. But this effort may be backfiring. As one Russian analyst noted last Thursday, controlling the media may not be enough this time around — particularly if the product is something no one wants to buy.
On the other hand, Yeltsin has used the possibility of the retreat of reformers in the upcoming elections to extract more money and some understanding from the international financial community. Such funds may not be sufficient to overcome Russia’s current economic difficulties, but any withholding of them almost certainly would make things worse — something even most of Yeltsin’s opponents are prepared to concede.
And because of both Yeltsin’s all-too-obvious political calculations and because of a growing sense by foreign investors that Russia is unlikely to prove to be the emerging market that Moscow and others had advertised, foreign investment does not appear likely to take off anytime soon.
Ukraine provides the latest and clearest example of this interrelationship between campaigns and economics. Last Thursday, Kyiv reported some of its worst economic figures ever. For the first six months of 1999, the State Statistics Committee said, foreign direct investment fell by half compared to a year earlier, foreign trade fell by 25 percent, and the GDP declined by three percent.
Not surprisingly, this bad economic news pushed the national currency down and outside the trading range that the Ukrainian authorities had pledged to keep it within for all of 1999. That in turn led to speculation both in Ukraine and abroad that Kyiv would soon be forced to accept an even greater devaluation of the hryvna. Most analysts in both Kyiv and the West blamed Ukraine’s current fix on the failure of Ukraine to complete economic reform and on its inability to defend itself from the consequences of the economic turmoil in Russia, which remains Ukraine’s largest trading partner.
But many of the experts said that Ukraine’s current economic problems would be compounded by the ongoing presidential campaign. The Ukrainian vote will increase uncertainty among investors, thus reducing the money needed to power an economic recovery.
But far more important and negative, they suggested, will be the fall-out from political infighting between the incumbent president who is seeking reelection and the parliament which opposes him. The former may seek to introduce economic changes that will generate immediate political support for himself, and the latter may oppose such steps precisely to win political advantage, even at the cost of still worse economic growth.
And just as in Kazakhstan, the Russian Federation, and several other post-communist states, this linkage of political campaigns and economic performance in Ukraine may have large and unpredictable consequences for both politics and economics there.
All Over the Globe is published by IPA House.
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