Nazarbayev wins 96% in polls
Source: Agencies |
April 5, 2011, Tuesday
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Print Edition
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KAZAKHSTAN'S veteran leader Nursultan Nazarbayev celebrated his landslide re-election yesterday.
Nazarbayev, 70, has made stability his main motto in the predominantly Muslim nation, where he has overseen market reforms and more than US$120 billion in foreign investment during more than two decades in power.
The Central Election Commission said yesterday that Nazarbayev had won Sunday's early presidential election with an overwhelming 95.5 percent of votes. In the previous polls in 2005, he won 91.2 percent.
"Of course, this turnout of almost 90 percent and more than 90 percent of your support for me is a sensation for Western states," an upbeat and emotional Nazarbayev told thousands of mainly young supporters gathered in a sports complex.
Nazarbayev supporters waved the national flag and chanted "Nursultan! Kazakhstan!" and "We won!" Many wore specially printed yellow or blue T-shirts with the English logo: "I Love President!"
"We have shown that if elections usually divide a nation into various party blocs, ours has only united us; while there is bloodshed and ethnic strife feud in the outside world, we stand united - all ethnic groups and religions of Kazakhstan," he said.
"If elsewhere they cut jobs and halt industrial output, we launch new factories and open new jobs; if somewhere they cut pensions, we raise them; if somewhere they cut wages, we boost them," he said to the rapturous applause of his supporters.
The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, chaired last year by Kazakhstan, has stationed more than 300 observers across the country and identified pre-election concerns about transparency of the vote and media freedom.
"International observers ... noted that reforms necessary for holding genuine democratic elections have yet to materialize," the OSCE said in a statement later yesterday.
"Regrettably we have to conclude that this election could and should have been better," Ambassador Daan Everts, head of the long-term election observation mission deployed by the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, said in the Kazakh capital.
Nazarbayev, 70, has made stability his main motto in the predominantly Muslim nation, where he has overseen market reforms and more than US$120 billion in foreign investment during more than two decades in power.
The Central Election Commission said yesterday that Nazarbayev had won Sunday's early presidential election with an overwhelming 95.5 percent of votes. In the previous polls in 2005, he won 91.2 percent.
"Of course, this turnout of almost 90 percent and more than 90 percent of your support for me is a sensation for Western states," an upbeat and emotional Nazarbayev told thousands of mainly young supporters gathered in a sports complex.
Nazarbayev supporters waved the national flag and chanted "Nursultan! Kazakhstan!" and "We won!" Many wore specially printed yellow or blue T-shirts with the English logo: "I Love President!"
"We have shown that if elections usually divide a nation into various party blocs, ours has only united us; while there is bloodshed and ethnic strife feud in the outside world, we stand united - all ethnic groups and religions of Kazakhstan," he said.
"If elsewhere they cut jobs and halt industrial output, we launch new factories and open new jobs; if somewhere they cut pensions, we raise them; if somewhere they cut wages, we boost them," he said to the rapturous applause of his supporters.
The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, chaired last year by Kazakhstan, has stationed more than 300 observers across the country and identified pre-election concerns about transparency of the vote and media freedom.
"International observers ... noted that reforms necessary for holding genuine democratic elections have yet to materialize," the OSCE said in a statement later yesterday.
"Regrettably we have to conclude that this election could and should have been better," Ambassador Daan Everts, head of the long-term election observation mission deployed by the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, said in the Kazakh capital.
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