Nazarbayev and the Making of Kazakhstan by Aitken Jonathan;Aitken;

Author:Aitken, Jonathan;Aitken;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Stories
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Published: 2019-11-23T00:00:00+00:00

10

New Currency – New Constitution – New Economy

Some crises take longer to resolve than others. Nursultan Nazarbayev had been swift to settle the nuclear issues that were dividing his fellow countrymen and worrying the world. By contrast, Kazakhstan’s economic and constitutional difficulties were more protracted. In the early phases of these sagas, Nazarbayev made errors of judgement. Eventually he took bold initiatives that solved most of the problems. However, his critics accused him of acting undemocratically, or even dictatorially, as he pressed ahead with his agenda of radical reform.

The rouble crisis was foreseeable yet surprisingly shocking to Nazarbayev when it happened. Within days of Kazakhstan becoming independent, he had grasped the exposed plight of its rouble currency whose supplies and exchange rates were at the mercy of Moscow’s central bankers. So one of his first acts as President was to issue a top-secret decree authorising the preparatory work on introducing a new national currency. Only five other people were privy to this state secret, of whom the most important was the Chairman of the Kazakhstan State Bank, Galym Bainazarov. He has recalled:

The President signed the decree and gave me the only copy to keep in my safe at the State Bank. I think he hoped that we would not have to implement it, but at the same time he had fears about what the Russians might be planning for the future of the rouble zone. So I was authorised to start planning for our own currency, which I did by buying new computers, making monetary calculations and even designing the banknotes.

These preparations were discussed at monthly meetings, chaired by Nazarbayev. One of the few light-hearted moments came when first drawings of the proposed banknotes were produced for inspection. They portrayed the head of the President on the largest denomination note. Nazarbayev, whether out of modesty or a sense of self-protection at a time when inflation was over 2,000 per cent, declined to be immortalised in this way, saying: “It’s only African Presidents who put their own faces on banknotes during their lifetimes.”

Commissioning local artists to design a new national currency was one of the first decisions. Another step was finding the right name for it. Nazarbayev’s choice was “the tenge”, which had its roots in mediaeval Kazakh history, when tanga coins were in use on the Steppes. This name also had contemporary resonance because the Russian word for money, dengi had the same linguistic root as tenge. This combination of balancing the ancient and modern cultures of his society was characteristic of Nazarbayev.

A more substantive problem was how to produce the new currency. Kazakhstan had no suitable printing press. The Russian mint could not be commissioned because placing an order with it would have given away the secret. So, in the end two experienced British companies, Thomas De La Rue and Harrison and Sons, were awarded the contract. “The quality of their banknotes, the financial side of the contract and the confidentiality all lived up to our expectations”, said Nazarbayev.

Although

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