What Did Astana and Kabul Do When the Crowds Came?

Spring saw significant public protests in both Kazakhstan and Afghanistan over issues of public policy. In Kazakhstan, frustration stemmed from impending changes to the Land Code and was ultimately flavored by an economic downturn and lack of governmental transparency in policymaking. In Afghanistan, it was the rerouting of a planned electricity transmission line that stirred up anger in a minority community long-neglected by Afghan rulers.

The issues at the center of each country’s protests are fundamentally different, but in general a state’s response to public demonstrations is not necessarily rooted in the issue itself; rather the response is linked to how the government perceives the protest and the government’s past experience in managing public displays of dissatisfaction.

Between Kazakhstan and Afghanistan, the latter is certainly viewed more widely as unstable; but as each government’s response to these recent public protests shows, Afghanistan comes out as better-prepared.

This, of course, boils down to experience. Afghanistan is no stranger to large public protests as well as the furthest extreme of such protests: downright revolt against the government. Perhaps because Kabul knows what real insurrection is like, thousands of demonstrators converging on the capitol in protest is less of a shock and necessitates a response, but does not prompt an overreaction.

Kazakhstan, on the other hand, is wholly unfamiliar with public protests of any sizeable mass. The government’s thinking about protests is colored by the events of December 2011, when unsanctioned protests in Zhanaozen, a third-tier oil town, became violent, with government security forces firing into a crowd. More than a dozen protesters were killed and discussion of the events were met with crackdowns on both traditional and social media. In the years following, numerous protesters were put on trial for inciting discord and several critical media outlets shut down.

With Zhanaozen as the most prominent and recent memory of large protests, Astana was spooked by even minimal protests. A civil society activist, Galymbek Akulbekov, held a five-minute one-man picket on April 20 in Astana before being detained by police. Thirty people attended a rally two days later in Almaty, Kazakhstan’s old capital and its largest city. Then on April 24, in Atyrau, a provincial capital in the oil-soaked west, reports say as many as a thousand people joined an unsanctioned protest. The protests grew, with unapproved gatherings, usually in the low hundreds or less, in Astana, Almaty, Aktau, Aktobe, Semey, Shymkent, Kyzylorda, and Zhanaozen. The Kazakh government, with the violence of 2011 perhaps in mind, refrained from breaking up the protests, though organizers were harassed or briefly detained before or after.

Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev initially decried the protesters, pledging that “those who spread false information, saying that the land will be sold to foreigners, must be apprehended and punished.” Then, as it looked like the protests would continue, Nazarbayev declared a moratorium on the planned land auctions that had kicked off the protests, sacked both the economy and agriculture minister, and set up a commission to manage information, especially regarding the Land Code changes.

But the genie was out of the bottle. While Astana may have felt that it had given a mile, civil society activists saw it as an inch. What began as protests against a specific policy became an outlet for broader frustrations. Planning went ahead for protests on May 21. Activists said they applied for permits but had been denied. A dozen activists were arrested in the week ahead of May 21; those who had applied for permits were arrested on charges of planning an unsanctioned protests.

When Saturday arrived, reports noted police cordons closing off large squares in Almaty and Astana. Police in full riot gear or black masks to obscure their faces chased and detained people gathering in a dozen cities. First, regular police in broad-brimmed hats would stand around menacingly, then a bus would pull up and men dressed in all black would flow out and grab the loudest protesters, or simply the nearest, and carry them onto the bus.

In one video, a woman in a bright pink shirt, with her arms held behind her by two policemen, sings the Kazakh national anthem as she is marched down the street. Hundreds were detained throughout the day and more than a dozen journalists were taken in. There were reports of interrupted access to Facebook in addition to several news and social sites. Most of those detained were released a few hours later but not all. It’s expected some will be tried on charges of inciting discord. The scenes that played out in cities like Almaty are visually very different from those from the protest in Kabul, which was magnitudes larger, several days before.

The most recent string of protests in Afghanistan related to the planned route of an energy transmission line from Central Asia through Afghanistan (TUTAP). The issue had been simmering since January, when internal government struggles over the specifics of where the line would cross the Hindu Kush spilled into the public. The government’s April 30 decision to route the line through Salang, rather than through Bamyan, marked the final turning point, however. Bamyan, a central province, is home to Afghanistan’s third-largest ethnic group, the overwhelmingly Shia Hazara, who suffered greatly under the Taliban and say they have been ignored by subsequent governments. The rerouting of the electricity line initiated a wave of protests. Rallies staged in Bamyan in early May (complemented by counter rallies in other provinces in support of the Salang route) drew a few thousand.

On May 16, thousands of protesters descended on Kabul to find the city ready for them. Overnight, the government placed 560 shipping containers as barriers on roads leading to the presidential palace--spending $32,480 to rent them for 24 hours. The police did not try to break up the protest, just keep it from approaching government buildings, and those marching were not carted off en masse for attending.

While Astana had Zhanaozen 2011 on its mind, Kabul had November 2015’s “Zabul Seven” protests at the forefront of its planning. Last November, after ISIS-affiliated militants beheaded seven Hazaras in Zabul, an estimated 20,000 people descended on Kabul with the coffins of the dead, demanding justice. They converged on the presidential palace, some storming the gates. Injuries were reported as flashes of chaos broke out, security officers firing into the air to break up those that converged on government buildings. This time around, Kabul forestalled the chaos and potential for violence should the protesters reach the presidential palace by blocking the way.

In a city that has seen numerous attacks and bombings, Afghan officials’ concerns that the protests could become a target for violence on the part of militants was legitimate. Astana has no such militants to worry about.

Ghani, speaking at an event in London the Friday before the May 16 protests, was interrupted by Hazara activists. Two were removed from the room and Ghani addressed a woman who was shouting at him. Though his comments were condescending, he acknowledged the anger among the Hazaras (even if he disagreed with it). This is something, as of writing, Nazarbayev has not done. As evening fell on May 21, Nazarbayev had not made any public statement addressing the attempted-protests in the country which, according to official election results, voted him into a fifth consecutive term as president by a soaring 98 percent last year.

To be clear: the analysis above is not an argument that Kabul did a perfect job in handling the broader issue at the heart of the protests or even the protests itself. The road blockades on Monday May 16 resulted in a virtual lockdown of Kabul and the Hazaras, like others in Afghanistan, have legitimate concerns regarding government transparency and accountability.

But Astana, obviously inexperienced and uncomfortable with public displays of discontent, panicked in the face of what should have been mildly inconvenient, but placid, weekend marches.

The Kazakh foreign minister had made the case ahead of the protests that the country’s democracy was maturing, that the right to assemble was enshrined in the constitution. But evidence was thin on May 21 that Kazakhstan is a “mature democracy,” able to comprehend that not everyone is content with the way things are.