Why Kazakhstan moved its capital to Astana

Why leave Almaty

When Kazakhstan became independent its capital was Almaty, a city that faces a greater risk of earthquakes and is plagued by heavy smog in winter.^[5]

President Nursultan Nazarbayev gave his own reasons. A capital, he said, should be in the central part of the country, at the crossroads of its transport corridors; a new city would be a symbol of the independent state and “a new idea and a new promising goal”, and a seed of economic growth.^[6]

It was also read as a move north, towards the long border with Russia and the Russian-speaking people who lived on Kazakhstan’s side of it: an effort to counter Moscow’s potential sway over them.^[5]

The move

On 6 July 1994 Nazarbayev put a report on moving the capital to the Supreme Council, which decided to move it from Almaty to Akmola, not without some resistance.^[5] A decree of 20 October 1997 declared Akmola the capital, and it officially became one on 10 December 1997.^[2] The new capital was presented to the world on 10 June 1998.^[6] Very few government institutions stayed behind in Almaty, and the city has since grown to close to 1.5 million people.^[5]

Six names

The town began in 1830 as Akmoly, a name that possibly means “white grave” in Kazakh, and became Akmolinsk, Russian for “(town) of Akmoly”, two years later. In 1961 the Soviet authorities renamed it Tselinograd, “Virgin Lands City”. After independence it went back to a form of its old name, Akmola, in 1992.^[1]

On 6 May 1998 a presidential decree renamed the city Astana. According to Kazakhstan’s official history portal, it answered a request from the local executive and representative bodies, reflected the wishes of the public, and followed the advice of the government’s State Onomastic Commission.^[2] Astana simply means “capital city” in Kazakh.^[1]

Named after the president

Nazarbayev announced his resignation on 19 March 2019 after almost thirty years in charge.^[1][3] The next day, taking his oath before parliament, his successor Kassym-Jomart Tokayev proposed renaming the capital to “perpetuate the name of the First President”. He also suggested naming main streets in the regional capitals after Nazarbayev and putting up a monument to him in the capital.^[4]

Parliament passed the change the same day, and Tokayev signed the decree on 23 March 2019.^[4] Some residents objected, or said they should have been asked first.^[1]

Back to Astana

In January 2022 protests that began over a sharp rise in fuel prices turned into deadly unrest, fed partly by anger at the power Nazarbayev still held; more than 200 people were killed. Tokayev removed Nazarbayev from the posts he had kept and announced reforms.^[3]

As part of what Tokayev called a “new Kazakhstan”, a parliamentary group proposed restoring the name Astana, and the lower house, the Mazhilis, approved it with other constitutional amendments on 16 September 2022.^[7] Tokayev signed them the next day. The same package limited presidents to a single seven-year term.^[3][8]