By 2025, the self-sufficiency of rural districts will increase up to 35%
According to the local self-government concept, residents will participate in making important decisions regarding their settlements
The Minister of National Economy Asset Irgaliyev presented a draft of Local Self-Government (LSG) Development Concept at a regular meeting of the Supreme Council for Reforms chaired by the President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, as reported at the ministry's website.
The new model of the LSG will be formed on the basis of five key principles:
- participation of citizens in the decision-making process;
- transparency and accountability to the public;
- electability of local self-government bodies;
- independence in solvin.organizational, economic and financial issues;
- differentiation of functions of the state bodies and local self-government.
The concept assumes the participation of residents in decision-making on important issues. For example, the issues of changing the status, names and boundaries of settlements, determination of the priorities of the local community.
A rural representative body will be formed – "Kenes", which will approve the implementation of the local community development plan and the budget, regulate the amount of tax rates at the rural level, and control the quality improvement of villages.
From 2022, an additional four types of taxes and payments will be transferred to the rural level. This is a single land tax, a fee for land plots use, proceeds from their sale and a fee for sale of the right to lease them. In 2023, a number of other taxes and payments will be transferred.
As a result of adoption of fiscal decentralization measures, the self-sufficiency of the budget of rural districts is expected to increase up to 35% in 2025.
The Draft Concept provides for measures for effective use of communal property objects and increasing the rational distribution of local budget expenditures.
- Inventory and registration of unregistered communal property objects will be carried out in a simplified manner.
- Akim of the rural district, together with "Kenes", will determine the types of property to be transferred to the communal property of local self-government.
- Standard design and estimate documentation will be developed to reduce the cost of social facilities designing in the villages.
As part of the ongoing work on the development of LSG Concept, direct elections of rural Akims will begin from the second half of 2021. According to the electoral legislation, there are two main ways of nominating candidates – from political parties and in accordance with self-nomination procedure. Introduction of direct elections of district Akims will be the next step starting from 2024.
"An Action Plan has been prepared for effective implementation of the proposed approaches with specific deadlines and responsible performers. All the above-mentioned measures will allow taking into account the real needs of the population and increase the level of trust of citizens in the local executive authorities," Asset Irgaliyev emphasized.
Experts of the Center for Regional Studies (CRS) of Economic Research Institute JSC (ERI) took an active part in the development of LSG Concept.
It is based on an analytical study conducted by CRS experts in 2018: "Improvement of institutional environment of the regions by increasing the efficiency of local self-government".
ERI experts have done a lot of work to prepare an analysis of the current situation of local self-government development, review of world experience and formulated relevant conclusions. Also, CRS specialists have developed proposals for the Action Plan for 2021-2030 to implement the Local Self-Government Development Concept in Kazakhstan.
"Implementation of this Concept will contribute to the activation of citizens themselves, creation of mechanisms for the government's control and accountability to the population, and improvement of the quality and living conditions," CRS experts note.
According to them, the local self-government development concept in the Republic of Kazakhstan until 2030 provides for the formation of a new model of local self-government by 2030. Implementation will take place in two stages: the first stage is from 2021 to 2024 and the second stage is from 2025 to 2030.
Draft LSG Concept was developed in accordance with the instructions by the Head of State during the Address to the people dated September 1, 2020 "Kazakhstan in a New Reality: Time for Action".
