The politics of Kazakhstan takes place in the framework of a semi-presidential republic, whereby the President of Kazakhstan is head of state and nominates the head of government. Executive power is exercised by the government. Legislative power is vested in both the government and the two chambers of parliament.
Nursultan Abishuly Nazarbayev is a Kazakh politician and military officer who served as the first President of Kazakhstan, from the country’s independence in 1991 until his formal resignation in 2019, and as the Chairman of the Security Council of Kazakhstan from 1991 to 2022.
A presidential election is the election of any head of state whose official title is President.
Kassym-Jomart Kemeluly Tokayev is a Kazakh politician and diplomat who has served as the President of Kazakhstan since 2019. Between 20 March and 12 June 2019, he served as acting president after the resignation of Nursultan Nazarbayev, who had been president for nearly three decades.
The Parliament of the Republic of Kazakhstan is the bicameral legislature of Kazakhstan. The lower house is the Mäjilis, with 98 seats which are elected to five-year terms. The upper house is the Senate, which has 50 members.
The President of the Republic of Kazakhstan is the head of state of the Republic of Kazakhstan and the commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of the Republic of Kazakhstan. The president is the holder of the highest office within the Republic of Kazakhstan. The powers of this position are described in a special section of the Constitution of Kazakhstan.
The Mäjilis of the Parliament of the Republic of Kazakhstan is the lower house of the bicameral Parliament of Kazakhstan. The upper house of Parliament is the Senate of Kazakhstan. There are 98 directly-elected seats in the chamber. Members of Parliament are elected to five-year terms.
Presidential elections were held in Kazakhstan on 4 December 2005. Incumbent president Nursultan Nazarbayev, in power since 1989, sought and won a 3rd term against four other candidates. Opposition candidates were allowed some access to the mass media, but this was still restricted. According to western election observers, opposition candidates also suffered considerable harassment. The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) criticized the elections, calling them unfair, but noted improvements.
The Senate of Kazakhstan is the upper house of two chambers in Kazakhstan's legislature, known as the Parliament (Parlamenti). The Senate is composed of elected members: two from each region and two from three municipalities which are Almaty, Astana, and Shymkent.
Amanat, previously known as Nur Otan until 2022, is a political party in Kazakhstan. Being the largest to date, it has been the ruling party of the country from 1999, with a membership claiming to be of over 762,000 people in 2007. The Amanat has been led by Erlan Qoşanov since 26 April 2022.
The 2007 amendment to the Constitution of Kazakhstan modified Kazakhstan's basic law, on May 18, 2007. The changes followed the conclusion of the activities of the 'State Commission on Democratization' formed two years previously.
Legislative elections were held in Kazakhstan on 18 August 2007 to elected. President Nursultan Nazarbayev's ruling Nur Otan party received 88% of the vote and won all of the available seats, as none of the six other parties contesting the election had managed to pass the 7% electoral threshold to win seats.
Legislative elections were held in Kazakhstan on 15 January 2012. The result was a victory for the Nur Otan party, which won 83 of the 98 seats in the Mäjilis. However, the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) stated that the election "did not meet fundamental principles of democratic elections." The elections marked the first time that the second-placed party would gain parliamentary seats irrespective of whether it cleared the 7% electoral threshold. Due to the Zhanaozen massacre and the resulting state of emergency there, the election was not planned to be held in Zhanaozen. However, this decision was overturned on 10 January 2012.
Sergey Alexandrovich Tereshchenko was a Kazakh politician. He served as the Prime Minister of Kazakhstan from 1991 to 1994 and later as the acting chairman of Otan from 1999 to 2002.
Snap presidential elections were held in Kazakhstan on 26 April 2015 to elect the President of Kazakhstan. This was the fifth presidential election held and second without having any formal opposition candidates. With the highest-ever nationwide turnout of 95.2%, the result was a victory for long-term incumbent President Nursultan Nazarbayev of Nur Otan who received 97.8% of the vote, the largest since 1991, thus winning a fifth term in office while his closest challenger, Turgyn Syzdyqov, received only 1.6% of the votes.
Snap presidential elections were held in Kazakhstan on 9 June 2019 to elect the President of Kazakhstan following the resignation of long-term President Nursultan Nazarbayev in March 2019. This was the sixth presidential election held since Kazakhstan's independence. The elections were not free and fair, and were widely denounced as a sham. Acting president Kassym-Jomart Tokayev of Nur Otan won the election.
Legislative elections were held in Kazakhstan on 10 January 2021 to elect the members of the Mäjilis to the 7th Parliament of Kazakhstan. They were the eighth legislative elections in Kazakhstan's history since independence and coincided with the 2021 local elections. The elections were the first to be held under Kassym-Jomart Tokayev's presidency and the first since 2004 to be held at the normally scheduled date, rather than due to an early dissolution of the Mäjilis.
Erlan Jaqanūly Qoşanov is a Kazakh politician who is serving as the member and chairman of the Mäjilis since 2022. Prior to that, he served as the Aqorda Chief of Staff under Kassym-Jomart Tokayev's administration from 2019 to 2022, äkim of Karaganda Region from 2017 to 2019 and the head of the Prime Minister's Office from 2012 to 2017.
The Parliament of the Republic of Kazakhstan of the 7th convocation was a convocation of the Parliament of Kazakhstan from 2021 to 2023.
