, 8 tweets, 2 min read Read on Twitter
Kazakh president Nazarbayev has resigned! Unexpected to say the least.
To put this resignation in perspective, this is only the third time in Central Asian post-Soviet history that a leader stepped down without a metaphorical gun to his head (both of the other instances were in Kyrgyzstan).
Nazarbayev was the 8th longest serving de facto ruler in the world. Central Asia does still have Rahmon, who comes in at #12 (with Nazarbayev gone).
Incidentally, with Nazarbayev and Bouteflika both gone (or nearly so), Putin makes the top 20 list. Still only third in the former Soviet Union region (after Rahmon and Lukashenka).
Prepare for a ton of "Putin about to conquer northern Kazakhstan" hot takes.
If there's one thing I learned from the successions in Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and even Kyrgyzstan, it's that their ultimate results are highly unpredictable. Too much depends on invisible factors, like leader preferences, elite preferences, their relationships, etc.
The elites themselves don't have all the information (if they did, they'd probably manage more predictable outcomes; see Kyrgyzstan). And the fewer institutional constraints (certainly the case in Central Asia), the more idiosyncratic individual & group dynamics come in to play.
Unless Nazarbayev maintains an iron grip on power (possible, though not probable), even he might be surprised by how the country looks a year from now. Speculation is fun, but barring unambiguous signals, we might all just have to sit and wait to see what transpires.
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