Legislative elections were held in

Kazakhstan Kazakhstan, officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a transcontinental country located mainly in Central Asia and partly in Eastern Europe. It borders Russia to the north and west, China to the east, Kyrgyzstan to the southeast, Uzbeki ...

on 10 October 1999, with a second round on 24 October. The result was a victory for the new Otan party, which won 23 of the 77 seats. Voter turnout was 62.5%.

Dieter Nohlen Dieter Nohlen (born 6 November 1939) is a German academic and political scientist. He currently holds the position of Emeritus Professor of Political Science in the Faculty of Economic and Social Sciences of the University of Heidelberg. An expe ...

, Florian Grotz & Christof Hartmann (2001) ''Elections in Asia: A data handbook, Volume I'', p420

Background

President President most commonly refers to: *President (corporate title) *President (education), a leader of a college or university *President (government title) President may also refer to: Automobiles * Nissan President, a 1966–2010 Japanese ful ...

Nursultan Nazarbayev Nursultan Abishuly Nazarbayev ( kk, Нұрсұлтан Әбішұлы Назарбаев, Nūrsūltan Äbişūlı Nazarbaev, ; born 6 July 1940) is a Kazakh politician and military officer who served as the first President of Kazakhstan, in off ...

announced by public

decree A decree is a legal proclamation, usually issued by a head of state (such as the president of a republic or a monarch), according to certain procedures (usually established in a constitution). It has the force of law. The particular term used for ...

on 7 July 1999 that the elections to both Houses of the Parliament (the

Senate A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...

and

Assembly Assembly may refer to: Organisations and meetings * Deliberative assembly, a gathering of members who use parliamentary procedure for making decisions * General assembly, an official meeting of the members of an organization or of their representa ...

) would take place on 17 September 1999 and 10 October 1999 respectively. The former

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

republic, independent since 1991, wanted to project with these elections a democratic image because its January

presidential election A presidential election is the election of any head of state whose official title is President. Elections by country Albania The president of Albania is elected by the Assembly of Albania who are elected by the Albanian public. Chile The pre ...

had been criticized in the

West West or Occident is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from east and is the direction in which the Sunset, Sun sets on the Earth. Etymology The word "west" is a Germanic languages, German ...

as unfair. For the first time, 10 of the 77 seats in the Assembly were contested on a party basis and opposition candidates were given access to the media.

Elections

International and domestic observers described the parliamentary election as flawed. The

Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) is the world's largest regional security-oriented intergovernmental organization with observer status at the United Nations. Its mandate includes issues such as arms control, prom ...

, that had deployed 200 observers to monitor the vote, reported that the election had fallen far short of international standards. It was alleged that innocent candidates had been treated unfairly and that voters had been pressured not to vote for certain candidates. About 60 percent of the eight million registered voters turned out for the ballot which was a much lower turnout than the one for the 1995

elections An election is a formal group decision-making process by which a population chooses an individual or multiple individuals to hold public office. Elections have been the usual mechanism by which modern representative democracy has operate ...

, at which voter participation was 79%. In the election to the Assembly, the ten seats allotted to political parties were decided in the first round on October 10, as well as 20 seats where candidates secured a majority. The remaining 47, where there was no clear majority, were decided at a second round which took place on 24 October. Kazakhstan's

election commission An election commission is a body charged with overseeing the implementation of electioneering process of any country. The formal names of election commissions vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, and may be styled an electoral commission, a c ...

called for new voting to be held in three of the 67 voting districts. The new polls would be held in Atyrau city and the South Kazakhstan and Dzhambul regions. The Kazakh election laws do not allow the original candidates to run again in the new voting in these three districts. For the Senate, on 17 September, deputies in the regional and city assemblies elected the 16 contested seats. Twelve of the new senators were nominated by Maslihats (provinces) and the other four were self-nominated.

Results

References

External links

Inter-Parliamentary Union Report on 1999 Kazakhstan ElectionsParliament of Republic of KazakhstanCentral Election Commission
{{Kazakhstan elections

Legislative election A general election is a political voting election where generally all or most members of a given political body are chosen. These are usually held for a nation, state, or territory's primary legislative body, and are different from by-elections ( ...

Elections in Kazakhstan Election and referendum articles with incomplete results