Family business of the President of Kazakhstan Kasym-Zhomart Tokaev
In June 2020, exactly one year passed since Kasym-Zhomart Tokaev was officially elected the President of Kazakhstan. It should be noted that the first President of Kazakhstan, Nursultan Nazarbaev, chose Tokaev to be his successor several years before his resignation. This was confirmed by Nazarbaev himself, saying in an interview that he was preparing a successor three to four years before the resignation. This was confirmed by Tokaev in an interview with Euronews in June 2019, “Already three and a half years ago, he told me that “it’s you who will be the next president”. It was a matter of time; we chose the moment.” There is an opinion that one of the reasons why Nazarbaev made a choice in favor of Tokaev was the pure reputation of the latter.
“Neither Tokaev nor his relatives were noticed in any major scandals. This, by the way, was one of the reasons why Nazarbaev set his choice on Tokaev; he doesn’t have a corruption trail …” said the Kazakh political analyst Daniyar Ashimbaev.
Is it really so? And what does the family of Kasym-Zhomart Kemelevich own? ACCA conducted its small but very interesting investigation.
Rich, but must
Kasym-Zhomart Tokaev was married to Nadejda Davydovna born in 1957. Today they are divorced. There is a few information about the ex-wife of the President of Kazakhstan. It is only known that during the years of Tokaev’s work as the Deputy Secretary General of the UN – the Director General of the UN Office in Geneva (March 2011-October 2013), Tokaevs were not divorced. Nadejda Davydovna was the honorary president of the UN Women’s Guild. Her photo is in the magazine “Bazar 2011”. In addition, there is a small interview in the official UN magazine “UN Special”.
According to insider information, the divorce occurred just before Nazarbaev’s resignation and Tokaev’s appointment as acting President. Allegedly, this was due to political considerations that the head of Kazakhstan couldn’t have a Russian wife. It’s unknown whether it is true or not.
However, we would like to quote from her interview that was mentioned above.
“When my husband was appointed to this high post [the Deputy Secretary General of the UN], it was a ground of great family pride,” said Nadejda Davydovna.
You must admit that only a woman, who passionately loves and thinks much of her husband, can say so …
Little is known about the only son of Kasym-Zhomart Kemelevich and Nadejda Davydovna – Tokaev Timur Kasym-Zhomartovich. He was born in 1984, studied in Geneva. In 2009, he defended his thesis on “The Strategy of the Republic of Kazakhstan in relation to the West”. He is engaged in business.
In general, trying to find information about Tokaev’s family, you come to the conclusion that it was thoroughly cleaned up. Maybe this happened exactly when Nursultan Nazarbaev decided to hand over the reins of power to a man who doesn’t have a scandalous trail.
However, something still managed to be found. So, Timur Tokaev is listed (as of August 16, 2016) as the owner of ordinary shares in the amount of 160 thousand pieces of KM GOLD joint-stock company. This information was published on the website of Kazakhstan’s stock exchange “KASE” in the Minutes of the special general meeting of shareholders of the company.
Perhaps, this company should be described in more detail. At the special general meeting of shareholders on August 16, 2016, the issue of creating new KM GOLD subsidiaries [the limited liability partnership “Adyr” and the limited liability partnership “ALTIN EMEL MINING”] was considered. In both companies, Sergey Ivanovich Yaskevich was appointed CEO. And he is the representative of Geomore International Limited, which, in turn, was a shareholder of KM GOLD (26.3% of voting shares as of August 2016). By the way, this company was among the Panama Papers, but this is not the main thing. It’s interesting that the Joint-Stock Company National Company “Social and Entrepreneurial Corporation Zhetysu” acted as a co-founder in the newly created companies. The share in interest of JSC NC “SEC-Zhetysu” in both firms amounted to 9.9%. The remaining 90.1% of the share were held by KM GOLD.
The JSC NC “SEC-Zhetysu” was established by decree of Nursultan Nazarbaev in April 2007. In November 2018, the corporation was renamed as JSC Regional Development Institute “Social and Entrepreneurial Corporation Жетiсу”. The sole shareholder of SEC-Zhetysu is the mayor’s office of Almaty region. The corporation has repeatedly been involved in corruption scandals. Information about them is easy to find on the Internet. We should add only that the created Adyr LLP and ALTIN EMEL MINING LLP received very advantageous contracts for the subsoil use of the copper-bearing site in Zhambyl district of Almaty region and the gold-bearing section of Koturkain in Kerbulak district of Almaty region.
In addition, the contract portfolio of KM GOLD also includes the deposit of Verkhne-Andasay, the ore zone of Chu-Ili, the ore field of Minaralsk, Shoyymbay square, Utegen-2 square, the ore development of Koturkain, Shinbulak gold ore field. At all that, the figures of tax deductions of the company are very curious. So, in 2015 they paid $31.6 thousand, in 2016 – $47.9 thousand, in 2017 – $10.5 thousand, in 2018 – $2.9 thousand, in 2019 – $2.4 thousand, and for the first six months of 2020 – $803.
According to KASE, the company’s net profit as of April 2020 went to minus (-$2.4 million), and the book value of ordinary shares fell to -0.27 cents per share. In 2016, the share price was equal to $0.004. It’s easy to calculate that if Timur Tokaev still owns 160 thousand shares, then he incurs enormous losses. If in 2016 the value of his share package was equal to +$640, today it’s already -$43 200.
Maybe this hit the state of Tokaev Jr. so much that he was among the debtors of the transport tax in front of the country’s budget. So, according to the State Revenue Committee of Kazakhstan, Timur Tokaev, who now has the name Kemel, has a debt of $762 at the current rate.
True, the President’s son has other companies. For example, Umit Investment LLP, engaged in the construction of residential real estate. The company was established in 2007, registered at the address: Nur-Sultan, Victory avenue, 3, apt. 191. In addition, Fortius LLP, located in Almaty, was down in his name. However, both of these firms, judging by the zero tax reporting, are inactive.
One more organization of Tokaev Jr. is hard to call commercial. This is a private fund “Kemel Tokaev Charitable Foundation”. Kemel Tokaev is the father of the current President of Kazakhstan. He is a famous Kazakh writer and is considered the founder of the detective genre in Kazakhstan.
The purpose of the fund, as stated on its official website, is the development of education, the provision of humanitarian assistance to students of the secondary school named after Kemel Tokaev and inmates of the orphanage of Ushtobe; grants for children from socially vulnerable families to study at universities, as well as support for talented students. There is also information about the head of the fund Timur Tokaev: “an entrepreneur, is engaged in real estate and technology startup projects”.
The partners of the fund are Abi Petroleum Capital and KazRosGaz (a joint Kazakh-Russian company created by the national company KazMunayGas and the Russian Gazprom JSC). The fund’s tax deductions in 2015 amounted to $788, in 2016 – $783, in 2017 – $337, in 2018 – $685, and in 2019 – $562.
Family business
It was not for nothing that we mentioned Abi Petroleum Capital. According to the Committee for geology and subsoil use, this company is included in the Register of subsoil users of the republic. It is headed by Izbastina Karlyga Kemelyevna. The fact that Mrs. Izbastina has the same middle name as the current President of the country is not a mere coincidence; she is his own sister.
The mention of Abi Petroleum Capital can be found for the first time in the investment memorandum of Sat&Company. It follows that Sat&Company owned 50% of shares in Kazakhstan Caspian shelf JSC, which was created in 1993 by the government of the Republic of Kazakhstan to conduct geological and geophysical research, exploration and production of oil and gas in the Kazakh part of the Caspian Sea. In 2005, Kazakhstankaspiyshelf JSC performed work at the oil field “Gryadovoye” by the order of Abi Petroleum Capital LLP. By the way, at the same time, this company also completed works at the deposit “Kariman-Esen” by the order of TatArka LLP. And this LLP, for a minute, was headed by the aforementioned M. Yaskevich.
Sat&Company is also a very curious company. The chairman of the board was Kenes Rakishev, one of the 50 most influential businessmen of Kazakhstan according to Forbes, whose fortune is over $600 million. In the list of Sat&Company’s affiliates, you can find such a famous and influential person in Kazakhstan as Imangali Tasmagambetov (at different times he served as Prime Minister, Mayor of Almaty and Astana, Minister of Defense, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Kazakhstan in Russia. In 2019, he retired on a pension). Tasmagambetov is Rakishev’s father-in-law. It should also be noted that the mentioned cooperation of Sat&Company through Kazakhstan Caspian shelf with Abi Petroleum Capital LLP in 2005 was at the period, when Kasym-Zhomart Tokaev was the Minister of Foreign Affairs and the head of government (what a coincidence!) was Imangali Tasmagambetov.
By the way, as previously was written in the Kazakh media, in 2012, the net profit of Abi Petroleum Capital amounted to $5.9 million. And this despite the fact that a year earlier the company generated a loss of more than $1 million.
The construction company “KEMAL CONSORTIUM LLC” is down in Izbastina’s name. According to some directories, it is an operating company, and according to others, it has already been liquidated, which again suggests that someone is actively clearing the traces of presidential relatives in the business environment.
There is another company, which, according to the same register of subsoil users of the Geology Committee, is headed by Mrs. Izbastina. It’s KZK GROUP LLP, which is engaged in prospecting for sand-gravel in the area “Almaly” in Almaty region.
Karlyga Izbastina is married to Temirtay Izbastin. He is the extraordinary and plenipotentiary ambassador of Kazakhstan in Bulgaria. They have four children: sons Kanysh, Muhammed, Beket and daughter Dana.
One of these nephews of Kasym-Zhomart Tokaev, Izbastin Kanysh Temirtayevich, is known to everybody. And it is no coincidence, because he is the chairman of the board of the joint-stock company “Kazagrofinance”. The sole shareholder of the company is the national holding of the same name, the shareholder of which, in turn, is the Ministry of Agriculture of Kazakhstan. Kazagrofinance leases agricultural machinery and equipment and provides loans to agribusiness entities. Kazagrofinance is the largest state-owned enterprise. The registered capital is $205.5 million, and the company’s equity is $283.2 million. Net profit for 2019 was $22.8 million. And all this is managed by the President’s nephew.
The second nephew, Muhammed Izbastin, judging by the protocol of the meeting of participants of Abi Petroleum Capital LLP, owns half of this company. The second half is owned by the son of the President of Kazakhstan Timur Tokaev. In addition, Muhammad Izbastin is an independent director, a member of the board of directors of East Kazakhstan Regional Energy Company JSC.
The youngest son, Beket Izbastin, until recently headed the subsoil use department of the Ministry of Energy (which was once headed by Kanat Bozumbaev, considered one of Tokaev’s closest relatives), and now he has headed PSA LLP, which is the Kazakhstan’s authorized body in the Production Sharing Agreement for Northern Caspian Sea and the Final Production Sharing Agreement for Karachaganak deposit, as well as for Dunga deposit.
In Kazakhstan’s databases, there is a few information about Izbastin’s daughter Dana, who now is Medeuova. However, there is information about her on Bulgarian resources (her father is the ambassador in Bulgaria). So, according to the information of the Commercial Register of the Open Data Portal of the Government of Bulgaria, three companies in Bulgaria are associated with the name of Dana Medeuova. These are SD Proparti Investmants, Dami Interneshanal and SoleCapitalOwner. Dami Interneshanal, whose sole owner is Dana Temirtayevna, is engaged in housing construction, design, mediation between Bulgarian and foreign companies, commission activities and much more. The company’s office is located in the business center on 137, Todor Alexandrov Boulevard, in the center of Sofia.
By the way, the head of Dami Interneshanal is a certain Marin Ivanov Kolowski, who at the same time, is the owner of Dami Investment and Wine & Art Ltd. Probably, we will not be very mistaken if we assume that these two companies are also part of Dana Temirtayevna’s business empire.
… And this is just the information that has remained in the public domain. It’s clear that Tokaev’s close relatives are not poor people. It can be seen that the second President of Kazakhstan is already gradually placing his people in profitable and promising positions. The fate of his two nephews is a striking example of this. At the same time, it’s clear that the biographers did a good job on the biography of the President and his inner circle, but not so good as to clear out all traces. So, it’s quite possible that some other details of the life of Tokaev’s clan will soon come up. And it’s quite possible that the image of the crystal-clear honest man, that has formed about the current head of state, will turn out to be quite different.
