KAZAKHSTAN: LIFE ON THE STEPPE, MARCH 7 - 13, 2009

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SIPDIS

STATE FOR SCA/CEN, SCA/PPD, DRL

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PGOV PHUM ECON SOCI SENV KZ
SUBJECT: KAZAKHSTAN: LIFE ON THE STEPPE, MARCH 7 - 13, 2009

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1. (U) This is another in a series of weekly cables drawn mostly
from public media, as well as think-tank, NGO, and opposition
web-sites, selected to show the diversity of life in Kazakhstan, and
information about it available to citizens of Kazakhstan. Our goal
is to choose what might interest and be of use to various end-users
in Washington and -- especially -- to provide a more complex view
from the other side of the world, illustrating the vitality (and
sometimes the quirkiness) of discourse available to citizens of
Kazakhstan.

KAZAKHSTANI REQUESTING BACK NATIONAL HERO'S HEAD


2. (U) In an open letter to President Nazarbayev, several dozen
members of Kazakh intelligentsia reportedly requested the
President's help in facilitating the return of the head of Kenesary
Khan from Russia. For more than 160 years, the head of the last
great Kazakh khan has been on display in various museums in Russia,
and local patriots find it's time to bring it "home." So far, all
requests have been refused -- first by Tsarist Russian Emprie, then
by the Communist Soviet Union, and now by the Russian Federation as
well.


3. (U) Kenesary Khan has a prominent place in the history of
Kazakhstan. He was the last khan to be acknowledged by all three
Kazakh hordes, and he led the last revolt against Russian armies in
today's Kazakhstan. In 1847, Kenesary Khan led his troops -- badly
depleted as more and more of his compatriots decided to distance
themselves from the warring khan to escape the wrath of Russia's
army -- into what became his final battle. Fighting the rival
Kokand khanate, most of Kenesary's men were killed, and the khan
himself taken prisoner. Subsequently, in a classic Central Asian
fashion of the time, he was beheaded and his head was sent as a
souvenir to the Russian tsar in St. Petersburg.


4. (U) As a Kazakh freedom fighter, Kenesary Khan was off limits for
almost 150 years, as both Tsarist Russia and the Soviet Union tried
to keep any sign of nationalistic tendencies in check. A paragraph
in a Soviet "History of the Kazakh SSR" described Kenesary Khan as
follows: "During 1837-47, he lead the reactionary feudal-monarchist
movement, aimed at Kazakhstan's secession from Russia. He
established a cruel, despotic rule (in Kazakhstan)." Since
independence, however, Kenesary Khan's status as a hero in Kazakh
literature and press has quickly risen. Today, a monument to
Kenesary Khan can be seen on the embankment of the Ishim river in
Astana, and one of the capital's main downtown streets carries his
name as well.

KAZAKHSTANI "BABUSHKA" THE OLDEST PERSON IN THE WORLD?


5. (U) Sakhan Dosova, a Kazakh "babushka" living on the outskirts of
Karaganda, will turn 130 years old this March -- or so she claims.
Dosova, who lives with her 42-year old niece, was "discovered" by
accident during this year's population census. Dosova herself was
ready to share the secrets of her long life: "Simply, I have never
taken any medicine or any pills. When I was sick, I drank herbs,
something you would find outdoors. I don't eat sweets, but do like
cheese and yogurt. We need to be happy in our lives, only then we
won't notice the years going by." Claiming to be born on March 27,
1879, she gave birth to ten children, the last of who was born when
she turned 64. Three of her children are still alive; her eldest
living son is 74 while the younger daughter just turned 65. The
national census reportedly revealed 35 other people older than 100
years in the Karaganda region. While census officials claim that
all available social and demographic data have confirmed Dosova's
age, the official longevity record still belongs to French
Zhanna-Louisa Kalman who passed away in 1997 at the age of 122.
(NOTE: It is highly likely that Dosova has "stolen" the identity of
a parent or grandparent. Similar longevity claims in Abkhazia have
involved such identity theft. The age of Dosava's children indicate
that she is most likely a nonagenarian, not about to turn 130. END
NOTE.)

TRASH MOUNTAINS "EMBELISH" KAZAKHSTAN'S BUSINESS CAPITAL


6. (U) Mountains of trash "embelish" the urban landscape of
Kazakhstan's largest city Almaty. Whose fault is it? Why have
ad-hoc landfills become an integral part of the city scenery?
"Karavan," a weekly newspaper, posed these questions to Yegor

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Tarkinskiy, a health department official, as he accompanied the
reporters on a tour of Almaty's urban "landfills." Tarkinskiy,
acknowledging the problem, blamed the disrespectful attitude of
residents towards the environment and the lack of an enforcement
mechanism that would permit punishing scofflaws. Tarkinskiy's
chilling examples often contained both of these elements: "As I
walk along the street, I see a young boy carrying a bag of trash and
throwing it into a drainage ditch on the side of the street, even
though there are trash bins right around the corner. I grab him by
his hand: 'What are you doing? Aren't you ashamed?' But then his
parents, who are walking behind him, are already all over me: 'Our
son will throw the trash wherever he wants to.' And as a health
department official, I cannot do anything besides lecturing to
them." And what can the city do to change this? Not much, says
Tarkinskiy. "If the people pollute their own environment and are
ready to live surrounded by trash, no one will help them."

NUMBER OF KAZAKHSTANI BILLIONNAIRES DROPS BY HALF


7. (U) The number of Kazakhstani billionaires in the Forbes
magazine's annual ranking of the world's richest people has fallen
from eight to four. Those who dropped from the list were: Vladimir
Kim, a major shareholder in London stock exchange-listed Kazakhmys
Plc, a copper mining group; Timur and Dinara Kulibayev, majority
shareholders in Halyk Bank, Kazakhstan's third largest bank (Dinara
is also the daughter of President Nazarbayev); Nurzhan
Subkhanberdin, the controlling shareholder of Kazkommertsbank, the
second largest bank in the country; and Bulat Utemuratov, former
owner of ATF Bank and a close confidante of President Nazarbayev who
was previously head of the management side of the Presidential
Administration. The three controlling shareholders of the Eurasian
Group, an industrial conglomerate whose crown jewel is Eurasian
Natural Resources Corporation (ENRC) -- Aleksander Mashkevich,
Patokh Chodiev, and Alijan Ibragimov -- are the only three
Kazakhstanis who retained their billionaire status from last year,
with each having $1.2 billion in assets at present. Bakhytbek
Bayseitov, the main shareholder and chairman of Bank CenterCredit,
is the sole Kazakhstani newcomer to the list with a net worth of $1
billion.

JOURNALISTS PAID WITH COUNTERFEIT CURRENCY


8. (U) Several journalists working for Kazakhstani dailies "Liter"
and "Aikyn" reported that they received their salaries in
counterfeit currency. The journalists found this out the hard way
during their weekend shopping when local merchants refused to accept
their money. "Several journalists only learned at the local markets
that their money was counterfeit. The vendors discovered (the
counterfeit bills) with the help of Chinese-made devices," one of
the affected journalists told the weekly "Respublika." Armanzhan
Baitasov, the general director of Nur-Media holding which took over
the two newspapers this year, confirmed the incident but refused to
speculate on the guilty party. "Here only an investigation will
help. We can only put our hope on our law enforcement
authorities."

HOAGLAND