US embassy cable - 05ALMATY4175

UNCLAS  ALMATY 004175 
 
SIPDIS 
 
 
SENSITIVE 
 
STATE FOR EUR/CACEN (JMUDGE), EUR/PPD (JBASEDOW), EUR/ACE 
(ESMITH/JMCKANE), DRL/PHD (CKUCHTA-HELBLING) 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV, PHUM, KPAO, KDEM, KZ, 2005 Election 
SUBJECT: REPORTING ON KAZAKHSTAN'S PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGNS - 
BETWEEN THE SPIRIT AND LETTER OF THE LAW 
 
Ref:  A) Almaty 4074 B) Almaty 3924 
 
1. (SBU) SUMMARY: According to a CIS elections monitoring 
representative, media coverage of presidential campaigns in 
the first two weeks of November "did not quite correspond" 
to legal and constitutional norms.  State media are 
honoring the letter, if not the spirit, of the information 
ministry's demand that all candidates get equal coverage. 
Although For a Just Kazakhstan (FJK) candidate Zharmakhan 
Tuyakbay received more coverage the first week of 
campaigning than any other candidate (ref A), the 
television reports were either uninformative or depicted 
contentious situations that FJK claims were contrived by 
unknown provocateurs.  The prosecutor ordered the 
confiscation of 100,000 copies of the opposition paper 
Zhuma Times in Almaty, and in Uralsk rail freight handlers 
destroyed 20,000 opposition papers.  Opposition editors and 
media advocates sent an appeal on November 12 to the 
European Parliament asking for its support.  END SUMMARY. 
 
CIS-EMO Sees Pro-Nazarbayev Bias, Accreditation Revoked 
--------------------------------------------- ---------- 
 
2. (U) At a press conference November 9, Stepan 
Novosel'chan, observation coordinator for the Commonwealth 
of Independent States-Election Monitoring Organization (CIS- 
EMO), said campaign practices for October 28-November 5 
"did not quite correspond to election legislation and 
constitutional norms."  He cited Tuyakbay campaign posters 
being displayed randomly on unauthorized sites like 
telephone and power poles, while Nazarbayev campaign 
posters dominated the billboards.  "I don't think that 
reflects the spirit of equal campaigning, when all 
billboards display the portrait of one candidate, in 
particular, Nazarbayev."  He also said more television 
reporting was devoted to Nazarbayev, in uniformly positive 
reports, while reporting on other candidates was scarce and 
tended to be critical. 
 
3. (U) On November 18 the Central Election Commission (CEC) 
cancelled CIS-EMO's observer accreditation because it is 
not an international organization, a violation of the 
electoral code.  Marina Bogdanovich, the head of the CIS- 
EMO mission Kazakhstan, told journalists the move followed 
the mission's interim assessment, which "contained rather 
tough accusations regarding the use of administrative 
resources and violations of the electoral process."  The 
mission sent a letter November 21 to the president asking 
him to intervene to reverse the decision.  Bogdanovich said 
the organization will appeal to the Supreme Court of 
Kazakhstan if no response is received within a week. 
 
4. (U) A comparison of state television coverage of the For 
a Just Kazakhstan (FJK) candidate Zharmakhan Tuyakbay and 
President Nazarbayev in the first two weeks of November 
corroborates Novosel'chan's assessment.  Reports on FJK on 
Kazakhstan 1, official successor to the Soviet- era state 
television network, and pro-presidential Khabar, which has 
the largest audience of Kazakhstani channels, were 
consistently negative.  Both often depicted contentious 
situations that FJK claims were contrived by unknown 
provocateurs.  Some reports were simply uninformative - 
meeting the letter, if not the spirit, of the information 
ministry's demand that all candidates get equal coverage on 
state media.  The reports often showed voters criticizing 
Tuyakbay and FJK activists, but little or no on-camera 
quotes from Tuyakbay explaining his positions on issues or 
proposals. 
 
Bland Reports on FJK Ignore Campaign Issues 
------------------------------------------- 
 
5. (U) Both Khabar and Kazakhstan 1 on November 4 reported 
on Tuyakbay's meetings with voters in Kostanay, Karaganda, 
Saran, and Atyrau and listed topics of discussion: 
employment, demographics, rule of law, social problems, tax 
policy and agriculture, without providing any context for 
his views.  There was no footage of him interacting with 
voters, explaining his ideas, or any quotes from his press 
conferences.  On November 7, Tuyakbay held a press 
conference during which he publicly revealed his annual tax 
payment and property holdings.  He challenged President 
 
 
Nazarbayev similarly to disclose his tax payments and 
property holdings and also to participate in a televised 
debate.  The report on Kazakhstan 1 showed Tuyakbay at the 
press conference, but the voice-over mentioned only that 
Tuyakbay had met with voters in Almaty, and had briefly 
informed them about his election platform and answered 
questions. 
 
Tuyakbay "Fights" With Voters . . . 
------------------------------------ 
 
6. (U) During the week of November 6, Khabar and Kazakhstan 
1 broadcast a series of reports on Tuyakbay's campaign, 
none of which highlighted the issues or showed him in a 
positive light.  One report showed Mukhtar Mukhambetzhan, 
the head of the foundation "For Unity of the Country," 
threatening to sue Tuyakbay proxy Serikbolsyn Abdildin for 
calling Mukhambetzhan a provocateur.  In another report, 
Marat Mukhamedzhanov, director of the Semipalatinsk 
pedagogical college, said he intended to sue Tolen 
Tokhtasynov, the head of Tuyakbay's campaign office, for 
allegedly cursing at him during a public event.  Kazakhstan 
1 reported November 23 that the municipal court of 
Semipalatinsk fined Tokhtasynov 48,550 tenge ($360), and 
ordered him to pay Mukhamedzhanov 100,000 tenge ($750) in 
moral damages.  Tokhtasynov said publicly that the 
videotape with the profanity had been altered and that he 
had not insulted the plaintiff. 
 
7. (U) A November 7 Khabar report of a Tuyakbay meeting 
with voters in Almaty illustrates how coverage was 
distorted to discredit the candidate with television 
viewers.  The first segment showed one person asleep and 
other people looking bored.  In the next segment, a crowd 
of participants and journalists were shown trying to enter 
a movie theater, but guards blocked the door and said they 
were carrying out orders from campaign organizers.  Next a 
woman was shown confronting Tuyakbay:  "You held a high 
position of authority and didn't manage to accomplish 
anything.  Does this mean only the president can get 
something done?  Does this mean that anybody you appoint 
will compete with you for power?  Won't this lead to 
instability in Kazakhstan?  We have peace now, and it means 
a lot."  Khabar showed part of Tuyakbay's answer:  "It 
doesn't mean instability for the people, but for those in 
positions of authority.  We don't need that kind of 
stability."  An emboff attended the meeting and said 
Tuyakbay's next statement was omitted:  "We still remember 
the 1930s, and we have no desire to return to those days." 
FJK representatives claim that a group of people came to 
Tuyakbay's November 7 meeting, pretended to sleep, then 
left after the Khabar crew had filmed them sleeping.  As 
for the guards shown blocking the entry of voters and 
journalists, Svoboda Slova (Freedom of Speech) 
correspondent Saya Issa told emboff they were not 
Tuyakbay's security guards, whom he knew after traveling 
with the campaign for the previous 10 days. 
 
. . . While Nazarbayev "Builds the Future" 
------------------------------------------ 
 
8. (U) Khabar, Kazakhstan 1, and centrist, independently 
owned Channel 31 reported in detail November 7 for several 
minutes on the president's visits in Almaty to the 
Institute of Seismology and a subway site under 
construction.  At the Seismology Institute, the president 
said he wanted to understand how earthquake stations were 
equipped to determine what must be done in the future to 
reinforce buildings and help authorities respond to 
emergency situations.  At the subway site, the president 
talked about his plans to ease traffic congestion in Almaty 
by spending 30 billion tenge (about $224 million) to 
complete seven subway stations over the next three years. 
 
More Opposition Newspapers Confiscated 
-------------------------------------- 
 
9. (SBU) The opposition website www.kub.kz reported that on 
October 26, a cordon of police surrounded the home of FJK 
activist Garifula Gumirov.  The police confiscated 12,000 
copies of the opposition papers Pravda Kazakhstana, Svoboda 
Slova, Ak-Zhol, and Epokha, and left, according to the 
 
 
website.  In another incident, Almaty's municipal 
procurator released a statement about the confiscation of 
Zhuma Times issue #44 on November 3 because it contained 
"false information defaming the honor and dignity of a 
presidential candidate in order to influence the election." 
An embassy source said a total of 100,000 copies were 
seized.  The procurator warned that law enforcement bodies 
would in the future employ all measures allowed under the 
law to prevent similar distribution of false information, 
including halting publication and prosecuting those 
responsible.  Galina Dyrdina, editor-in-chief of the banned 
opposition newspaper Respublika, described another case for 
Helsinki Commission Chief of Staff Sean Woo in a meeting 
arranged by the embassy press office November 18.  She said 
Tuyakbay's campaign headquarters paid to ship 20,000 
opposition newspapers to Uralsk via rail November 13.  When 
the train arrived, a supervisor ordered freight handlers to 
destroy all the newspapers.  When FJK members later 
questioned the supervisor about directing his employees to 
destroy the papers, he denied having told them to do so. 
 
Opposition Media Fight Back 
--------------------------- 
 
10. (U) On October 27, the opposition newspaper Soz- 
Respublika issued a front page statement that it would not 
participate in the electoral campaigns on behalf of any 
candidates.  "We doubt that this election will be fair, 
free, or just.  The authorities that destroy the opposition 
press, harass members of opposition parties, send crowds of 
police against unarmed people, and imprison boys and girls 
who dare to announce their disagreement with state politics 
will never conduct fair elections!"  On November 15, a 
group of 54 Kazakhstani opposition journalists and free 
speech advocates issued a public appeal to the European 
Parliament asking for its support given "the disastrous 
situation facing the independent press on the eve of the 
presidential elections."  The appeal cites the illegal 
confiscation of newspapers, the closure of newspapers 
without trial, readers of opposition newspapers being 
harassed by law enforcement organs, refusal by the 
information ministry to register new independent or 
opposition media, government regulation of Internet domain 
names with the intent to prevent independent media from 
publishing online, and the draft media law that will make 
registration of new media more difficult. 
 
Mixed Reaction to Presidential Debate 
------------------------------------- 
 
11. (U) On November 17, Yerasyl Abylkasymov, Alikhan 
Baymenov, Mels Yeleusizov and Zharmakhan Tuyakbay 
participated in a live hour-long debate televised on 
Khabar.  Central Elections Commission Chairman Onalsyn 
Zhumabekov said government funds would cover the cost of 
air time.  Tuyakbay's headquarters stated publicly that the 
event was a good opportunity for the candidates to talk 
about their programs.  In contrast, the Ak Zhol-affiliated 
newspaper Zhas Alash listed several criticisms of the 
debate in a November 19 article.  The paper noted there was 
no advance publicity, so most people did not know about it; 
the time slot of 6 p.m. was calculated to coincide with the 
evening commuter rush hour, when most people would be en 
route home from their jobs; the electricity went out in 
different regions of Almaty; the debate lasted only one 
hour, instead of the hour and a half that had been 
previously announced.  At the meeting with Woo independent 
opposition journalist Sergey Duvanov also raised the issue 
of the timing of the debate and his suspicions about the 
power outage, which also occurred in Karaganda at the same 
time. 
 
12. (SBU) Regarding such charges, the 6 p.m. timeslot was 
arguably inconvenient for commuters, but proving the 
electricity was sabotaged is more problematic.  A power 
failure also occurred in February during the president's 
annual address; unreliable electricity affects those in 
power and political aspirants with equal opportunity.  As 
for reducing the amount of time for the debate, 
Zhumabekov's explanation was plausible:  the CEC 
anticipated enough time for five candidates to debate and 
Nazarbayev's absence meant less time was needed.  In 
 
 
Kazakhstan's evolving political process, inconvenience and 
conspiracy converge when the president's loyalists in the 
media intervene to skew the reporting.  Yet the government 
is taking steps to democratize and regularize the campaign 
by monitoring media coverage to ensure equitable treatment 
of all candidates (see reftels) and by buying airtime for a 
televised debate on the most popular Kazakhstani TV 
channel. 
 
13.  Dushanbe minimize considered. 
 
Ordway