ASTANA (Sputnik) – Long-time Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev has announced his intention to run in upcoming April 26 snap presidential elections.
“I’ll probably agree with you on nominating my candidacy,” Nazarbayev said during a Nur Otan political party meeting.
Nazarbayev, 74, has been the president of Kazakhstan since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991. He was reelected to his fourth consecutive term in April 2011.
The previous election runup in 2011 saw a vast majority proposing a referendum to extend Nazarbayev’s credentials until 2020, but the president refused to do so. About 95 percent of Kazakhs voted for Nazarvayev in 2011.
The Kazakhstan constitution states that a candidate cannot be elected president more than twice in a row. Nazarbayev, however, was exempted from presidential term limits by a constitutional amendment in May 2007.
