On March 1, 2024, everyone in Kazakhstan woke up in the same time zone. From the western city of Aktau to Oskemen in the far east, the workday started at the same time. In January 2024, the government had made the decision to merge the country’s two time zones into one, shifting the eastern regions to the UTC+5 standard that the western regions were observing.
The decision was harshly criticized by the population living in the eastern regions, which include Astana, the capital, and Almaty, the largest city. The amendment of the law regulating time in Kazakhstan seemed to be an innocent bureaucratic decision, but it became a bone of contention amid several other top-down decisions.
Speaking at the National Kurultai last Friday, President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev asked his fellow countrymen to drop the issue.
“We conducted studies that did not confirm any of the public concerns… Our large country with a relatively small population should have a single time zone,” Tokayev said. “I think that this discussion should be stopped, and that this issue should not be politicized.”
Days earlier, on March 12, a number of people that called for a return to two time zones had lodged the idea to form a political party around the issue.
Kazbek Beisebayev, a public figure, said in his Telegram channel that the government failed to give a detailed explanation for the decision to merge time zones and, after months of sending requests, the groups that oppose the decision have no recourse left but to form a political party.
“It’s time to create a new political party. We should try to enter the institutions this way, in order to return the stolen time,” Beisebayev said.
It is perhaps with reference to this announcement that Tokayev discouraged any attempt to “politicize” the issue.
A Demoscope poll in December 2024 showed that around 53 percent of people were against the time zone merger, compared to just 22 percent in favor.
Around the same time, the ruling Amanat party surprisingly questioned the decision and proposed a new discussion on whether a single time zone was the right solution. The government also budgeted 54 million tenge (around $110,000) for a study on the effects of the change on people’s health.
On March 11, however, the government scrapped the plan for a detailed study, saying it would take too long. “It makes no sense to wait three years and spend money on this,” Minister of Science Sayasat Nurbek said.
The government had conducted a number of monitoring assessments that had shown no negative effect on people’s health over the past 12 months.
The day after the government scrapped the comprehensive study, the Amanat party also changed its position.
“A comparative analysis has shown that many developed European countries have sunrise and sunset times similar to those in Kazakhstan,” Deputy Prime Minister Yermek Kosherbayev said during a press briefing.
From the western regions of Spain to the easternmost point in Greece, in fact, there is a single time zone, spanning around 30 degrees in longitude. For comparison, Kazakhstan is about 40 degrees from east to west. In the U.S., however, time zones approximately follow a pattern of a one-hour difference every 15 degrees of longitude.
Between 1989 and 2000, Kazakhstan was split into three time zones, which reflected even more accurately the natural time of the Earth’s rotation around the sun.
But perhaps the issue is not just about the time change. The people of Kazakhstan have had to endure a number of top-down decisions over the past few years with little to no possibility to appeal. Whenever dissent has been voiced, it has been shut down by a “final decision” – as was the case with the referendum last year on the construction of the country’s first nuclear power plant, which was only nominally preceded by a public discussion.
By expending effort to stifle debate on an issue as bland as time zones, Kazakhstan’s government again makes clear that any and all dissent is unwelcome.