Yuneman commented on the appointment of Roman Sklyar as acting Prime Minister of Kazakhstan. He suggested that the decision could be a response to accusations against the country’s authorities in connection with the increasing frequency of inter-ethnic conflicts.
“In this regard, appointing a Russian prime minister is a very good PR move, especially since he is a competent person, judging by his biography. We can show everyone that our second person is Russian, and then what is there to talk about? If this is really the case, Tokayev can only, so to speak, be given a carrot for his ingenuity,” the political scientist noted.
According to Yuneman, such a decision refers to the practice of appointing deputy heads of the USSR republics from among the Russians. He also emphasized that Sklyar was able to achieve serious hardware successes, despite his relatively young age.
On February 5, Tokayev dismissed the government of Kazakhstan led by Prime Minister Alikhan Smailov. Smailov was appointed by the president to the post of head of the cabinet of ministers after mass protests in 2022 and reappointed in March 2023 after elections to the lower house of parliament.
