Kazakhstan’s New Parties Struggle to Register

On June 1, the ministry of justice registered Adilet (Kazakh for “Justice”), a new party that could soon become a contender in Kazakhstan’s political scene.The initiative group behind the party was formed soon after the Constitutional referendum in mid-March and the party’s first congress was held on May 7.By going through the registration process within just a few weeks, Adilet became the fastest party to achieve official status in Kazakhstan’s recent history.What follows is a May 2022 piece, originally published in Russian at Vlast, describing the long and difficult journey that some parties have struggled with since President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev announced the opening of the country’s political environment in 2022.As a note, the membership threshold for applying to register a political party was slashed from 20,000 to 5,000 with amendments to the Law on Political Parties in November 2022.To date, out of all 16 parties mentioned in the article, only Baitak and Respublica were allowed to register.In April 2022, Kazakhstan’s minister of justice Kanat Mussin announced that his ministry had received 10 applications for the formation of new political parties since 2019, with the majority submitted following the 2022 presidential election.But despite a flurry of political activity, not a single new party has been officially registered.In fact, Kazakhstan has fewer registered parties today than it did three years ago.Bureaucracy bears much of the blame.Only three groups have managed to clear the first stage of registration, which requires forming an initiative of at least 1,000 members, while none have passed the second of collecting 20,000 supporter signatures, a threshold that was recently lowered as a gesture towards liberalization.These reforms have been framed as part of a broader push to increase political competition, but few aspiring parties believe official registration will become easier.Vlast spoke with several founders about what the process looks like from the inside.People’s Congress of Kazakhstan Revived in April 2022, the People's Congress of Kazakhstan had begun as a social movement before pivoting toward formal politics, with workers’ rights at its centre.It also focused on nationalizing profit from natural resources and tackling problems facing young people, particularly unemployment. “Currently, we have 15,000 supporter signatures,” said Omarkhan Oksikbayev, a former Majilis deputy from the ruling Amanat party and one of the movement’s leading figures. “I think we will collect the 20,000 required by law.Our goal is to submit before the government lowers the threshold to 5,000.”