By Constitution of Kazakhstan “…the land, its suboil, water, wildlife and vegetation, as well as natural resources are state property…”  In other words, they belong to the country.  The other question is who really owns Kazakhstan and why there still are talks about the riches of our state sold out?

Soviet Paranoia?

Almost all geologic and geophysical information about Kazakhstan is classified.  The most interesting pieces of that information are classified.  For example, topographic maps of land allotments, keys to encrypted data, location of wells, their specifications etc.  That sort of data constitutes almost 80% of G&G (Geology and Geophysical).

A common geologist cannot gain access to that information and cannot sometimes justify necessity to study a certain piece of subsoil.  Thus, the state lose opportunity to make money from a classified piece of land and subsoil. 

We could substantiate above limitations by the fact that G&G are closely tied to topography and mapmaking.  Those two deal with aviation and missile/rocket technology.  In the USSR the explanation was that such secrecy was necessary to successfully confront West and protect the country from missile launches from there.  Times changed.  Rockets and missiles today are being launched on basis of new technologies and procedures, but the G&G secrecy is the same.

So, does it mean we got things to hide?

No Food, No Drink, No Money, Have I None

Independent Kazakhstan has long history of protests and debates associated with illegal sales of land.  Common people will keep demanding adoption of laws prohibiting privatization of land by non-citizens of Kazakhstan.  While masses were protecting, our streets, parks and fields were secretly made property of if not expatriates, then local oligarchs.  One bright example of that was an incident, when the Uralsk Town administration sold public land to a private owner.  In the result of that, 3 or 4 companies own the major part of the land in the province.  Local government and land development administration keep their eyes closed on that.

River Chagan was also privatized.  Its basin is the home for rare animals and fishes.  If to study carefully the official land register, we will find out that local government sold the river out to private owners, which owners shared the river with private land development companies. That means that in the nearest future that natural habitat for numerous Red Book species shall be endangered, because land developers will chop the trees and bring tons of concrete.

It is obvious that national laws do not work, when it comes to land privatization.

Land to China?

Article 58 of the Land Code stipulates that civil construction in recreational zones is prohibited.  Whenever such zones are privatized, environmental protection prosecution, anti-corruption bodies and local land development administrations must absolutely interfere. In practice, those bodies remain inert, which puts forward two conclusions – they either do not want to bother, or they take part in such deals.

However, putting the blame on land developers is not always possible.  Again, because independent lawyers and ecology activists do have access to land databases.  Sometimes, they acquire some fragments of documents, based on which they conclude that certain land development projects shall be to the detriment of nature. 

– There are latifundios seated in the Parliament.  Some of them are in charge of land use committees.  They own 100-300 hectares of land.  Our appeals to stop that piracy and revisit earlier decisions get lost in the House lobbies.  I promise, we will check how much land is owned by each deputy and then we will see why the House blocks important laws – once said Lawyer Bakitzhan Bazarbek in an interview given to Ulysmedia.kz.

There is nothing to confront the above.  The land in Kazakhstan is privatized, as follows – somebody solvent enough buys a piece of land and then sells it to an expatriate.  Almaty folks are most confident that in Almaty land is thus sold-out to Chinese. 

By law concerning notaries in Kazakhstan, notaries are not allowed to register such deals.  De facto, those deals have no legal power.  But how is it like in practice?